tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-66872398215685973402024-03-05T00:52:21.907-08:00Easel TalkAn Art Blog using my own paintings as the starting point for personal memoir and musings about painting.Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.comBlogger35125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-19373116619441168032014-10-27T21:40:00.000-07:002014-10-27T21:40:48.196-07:00By-products of Painting: Little Round Things<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2Vno8d0-lO0DfBKlWyx9Q-QsBOlmDT4q0zWw6KZN-hFQ_X4EdpvHj4UJ-mC-NhlGsoH0rB2Ab8vX1Y1Ch-hILjGefp0OssoDUavE_U8zlol9Bx8gRiqnY9Rc8hlLCbJTYCas8RZ4Y_f3s/s1600/Celebration+36x42+2014.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2Vno8d0-lO0DfBKlWyx9Q-QsBOlmDT4q0zWw6KZN-hFQ_X4EdpvHj4UJ-mC-NhlGsoH0rB2Ab8vX1Y1Ch-hILjGefp0OssoDUavE_U8zlol9Bx8gRiqnY9Rc8hlLCbJTYCas8RZ4Y_f3s/s1600/Celebration+36x42+2014.jpg" height="342" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Celebration - </i>acrylic - 36" x 42" - 2014</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I recently received the pleasing news that my collage <i>Celebration </i>had been accepted for an exhibition. "Pieced Together" will open at the Cultch, 1895 Venables St. in East Vancouver, on Wednesday November 5 and run to December 7. (Please see <a href="http://www.thecultch.com/">www.theCultch.com)</a> This will be the first time that I have been able to exhibit any of my "little round things" outside my own studio.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I have been creating and accumulating acrylic paint discs for several years. It all started as a way to minimize the amount of paint that I put into the environment via the sink drain and our water system. I was shocked to see painters washing heavily laden brushes and palettes under the tap without scraping off excess paint first. Although acrylic paint is less toxic than other media it contains heavy metals--notably cadmium--and various dyes, binders and other chemicals that are potentially harmful to human and animal health. So I developed a few habits that are second nature to me now. They do slow me down a bit, but that gives me time to think. In a painting session I tend to use a different brush for each colour, and I have to keep them wet. Before plunging a brush into my pot of water I rinse and scrape it into a small plastic vessel such as a yogurt container. The water evaporates over a few days and gradually the paint hardens into a disc lining the bottom of the pot. When it's quite dry, and thick enough to hold together, I weasel it out with tweezers. Soon after starting this practice I began to control the colour combinations a bit, putting all my green scrapings into one pot, reds into another, etc., and then perhaps adding a contrasting hue. I noticed that some pigments--cadmium and earth colours--drop to the bottom, some, such as ultramarine, granulate, and others, the synthetic dyes, form smooth transparent layers. It's a chemistry lab in miniature.</span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqJdmTxAUMpFPIGvD-X8bjaxZf_bHilc5ttXzmTNIjPggnQsKY_fYidQoNwgve1FPAZHtjWVh1wl8urOyv9qIK5qyPHHKA991mpJl80rW70qR6iyn9GzXN-tVT10mUggxze8LsHa7ROcm-/s1600/Coxcomb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqJdmTxAUMpFPIGvD-X8bjaxZf_bHilc5ttXzmTNIjPggnQsKY_fYidQoNwgve1FPAZHtjWVh1wl8urOyv9qIK5qyPHHKA991mpJl80rW70qR6iyn9GzXN-tVT10mUggxze8LsHa7ROcm-/s1600/Coxcomb.jpg" height="185" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeWdbhsI7W66lQOsROjuNrusNO2hhJgYDGMc_rxIBF_pW5ueaiD0j66isuiKuUg39C8JRYRpf_wPuCEKfJlmsXD3PNdA8CO-TEZWW0I3sIOFU1wgUTXVKMQ9DFejlIOD4fCiv9nxMM3BZo/s1600/Red+Rooster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeWdbhsI7W66lQOsROjuNrusNO2hhJgYDGMc_rxIBF_pW5ueaiD0j66isuiKuUg39C8JRYRpf_wPuCEKfJlmsXD3PNdA8CO-TEZWW0I3sIOFU1wgUTXVKMQ9DFejlIOD4fCiv9nxMM3BZo/s1600/Red+Rooster.jpg" height="177" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Maybe only their mother could love them, but I find these miniature abstracts fascinating. Each one is unique, and some are quite beautiful. Some suggest images of real things, such as the one on the right, which I called "Cockscomb."</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGqS5KfYQOct7YD-b9qCSXgqK30t8g04JTIagD0Eeoewv4voG6MDBcrV8-clfhoMRRdcUMmvKwgvkwMaKJgi7wO97japanSRAXggkOTKIaDLoTGmYx2A-jIn77cDzCnrktf7h-pOi9OMWB/s1600/White+blob.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGqS5KfYQOct7YD-b9qCSXgqK30t8g04JTIagD0Eeoewv4voG6MDBcrV8-clfhoMRRdcUMmvKwgvkwMaKJgi7wO97japanSRAXggkOTKIaDLoTGmYx2A-jIn77cDzCnrktf7h-pOi9OMWB/s1600/White+blob.jpg" height="195" width="200" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgf6tvXS5OjiKUK18qopXHVxSIvXP59IzpOD09VU-z9N6tRacOusWCp-5xwAIvN60Cu9OZU9G1rEmkvMFRPa8SOfCaqDKSL5huX8fACEfFy-7hdOoSfOFsbtiBF-NR8_DGa28NuVGsv-ZuQ/s1600/9+Paint+discs.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgf6tvXS5OjiKUK18qopXHVxSIvXP59IzpOD09VU-z9N6tRacOusWCp-5xwAIvN60Cu9OZU9G1rEmkvMFRPa8SOfCaqDKSL5huX8fACEfFy-7hdOoSfOFsbtiBF-NR8_DGa28NuVGsv-ZuQ/s1600/9+Paint+discs.jpg" height="191" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Nine Paint Discs - </i>10" x 10"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Little round things are not, however, easy to work with. I have a large collection now, and have made a few attempts to do something with them by mounting them in various ways. Two of these efforts have sold: <i>Nine Paint Discs </i>is a formal arrangement on a plain white </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMCZgZXPFAyE2NBdKtGFAU4nqhU7lwEM3jAMpHEIWe8SE6eYZFwhchQg8QBcM2F_Htqv_8nFUTbKylVkktz68k0P49omVV40wLYIABav5ttkGIk_fCmDIYzGP5DDpUVf7K14GWSFQdpQ2v/s1600/Pie+in+the+Sky.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMCZgZXPFAyE2NBdKtGFAU4nqhU7lwEM3jAMpHEIWe8SE6eYZFwhchQg8QBcM2F_Htqv_8nFUTbKylVkktz68k0P49omVV40wLYIABav5ttkGIk_fCmDIYzGP5DDpUVf7K14GWSFQdpQ2v/s1600/Pie+in+the+Sky.jpg" height="200" width="198" /> </a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;">Pie in the Sky - </span></i><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;">7" x 7"</span><i><br /></i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">panel, and <i>Pie in the Sky </i>consists of three discs on a<i> </i>bit of a discarded canvas.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6Mj6K1_j8r6RVxeUZKXFynBQirESF5jGu4s-gT5PYATf5sYz77DSkMHQEkHpWRHmveXsDUzP15C3SRpYcUe4Yfk4Otj823REfO0IlPGWcaFv-eWG0znqtqEChYELOIdQo-X7y5TbCrYiT/s1600/Paint+Disc+Abstract+3+2010+4x4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6Mj6K1_j8r6RVxeUZKXFynBQirESF5jGu4s-gT5PYATf5sYz77DSkMHQEkHpWRHmveXsDUzP15C3SRpYcUe4Yfk4Otj823REfO0IlPGWcaFv-eWG0znqtqEChYELOIdQo-X7y5TbCrYiT/s1600/Paint+Disc+Abstract+3+2010+4x4.jpg" height="200" width="199" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Paint Disc Abstract 3 - </i>4" x 4"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I also experimented with scanning a disc, blowing up the image and printing it out, sometimes collaging an actual disc onto the print.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjijpevSmGBROfjmjFvNkRUM4iud3l6Tqlef1h_zRCwBXYgXGDdxzYlAGhzBJ-eSYLIS5m5U2LudzOVUI6NTyxcpY8HMKHMJrrkjoxo_L-UX6h4dnJV3bEr0U0KaFeTDUbkjMc3ijSDI9-N/s1600/Paint+Disc+Abstract+6+2010+4x4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjijpevSmGBROfjmjFvNkRUM4iud3l6Tqlef1h_zRCwBXYgXGDdxzYlAGhzBJ-eSYLIS5m5U2LudzOVUI6NTyxcpY8HMKHMJrrkjoxo_L-UX6h4dnJV3bEr0U0KaFeTDUbkjMc3ijSDI9-N/s1600/Paint+Disc+Abstract+6+2010+4x4.jpg" height="320" width="317" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><i>Paint Disc Abstract 6 -</i> 4" x 4"</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I have a couple of other ways of making by-products while painting. At the end of the day if I have still-moist paint on my palette I scrape it into an airtight container, give it the occasional stir, and eventually have neutral grey paint to use on the edges of my canvases.</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Even the paint-laden water in the pots used for rinsing my brushes and keeping them wet gets re-purposed. I pour it into a pail and let it evaporate until I have a disc up to a foot across. A lengthy process, but a lot of paint saved from the drain. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">All this is fine as far as it goes, but I would really like to incorporate discs into a larger conceptual work, where the medium and the subject matter are closely identified. I'm not quite there yet, but <i>Celebration</i> is a step closer. I made it to submit to a show with a recycling theme, but first I tried a formal arrangement with the discs representing the triangular logo that indicates a recyclable container. <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQUuflCcBr5ZrsDaH7qjSRqhhLFBS85CjFbvAmJLm2Nusyuhcz8dFPjN8RBhWa_3-CZm_cdMhDzSp0ExjpLXzT27cKCe342g3RW9hI1simwuzyG2-XNfvNc2CWWnmUOn5uGEYiDXUWuR5S/s1600/Canada+recycles+19x26+2014.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQUuflCcBr5ZrsDaH7qjSRqhhLFBS85CjFbvAmJLm2Nusyuhcz8dFPjN8RBhWa_3-CZm_cdMhDzSp0ExjpLXzT27cKCe342g3RW9hI1simwuzyG2-XNfvNc2CWWnmUOn5uGEYiDXUWuR5S/s1600/Canada+recycles+19x26+2014.jpg" height="230" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;">Canada Recycles - </span></i><span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;">19" x 26" - 2014</span></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwAxIbc7jLee-Ccc4FmZkpjwp7GsAhoo1F7Xk_MvUXQIM7tMBAf2tFKRQIpVJdn_UF1Vw8L6RXZN7QTrJRYVjmyqQbZwG39VfMorAfvJCJ5PhNjAhPrXRAG20T8Ry5yt9xNmK9-aw1Hau4/s1600/Canada+Recycles+detail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwAxIbc7jLee-Ccc4FmZkpjwp7GsAhoo1F7Xk_MvUXQIM7tMBAf2tFKRQIpVJdn_UF1Vw8L6RXZN7QTrJRYVjmyqQbZwG39VfMorAfvJCJ5PhNjAhPrXRAG20T8Ry5yt9xNmK9-aw1Hau4/s1600/Canada+Recycles+detail.jpg" height="186" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;"><i>Canada Recycles </i>detail</span></td></tr>
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I included the word "Canada" in the title because it is clearly visible on many of the discs. The lettering on the base of the yogurt container, reversed on the inside, has embossed the hardening plastic.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Neither of these compositions made it into the recycling show, which was disappointing at the time, but the important thing is that I was motivated to produce something with my discs. Doing just this little bit to lessen the assault of human activity on the natural environment gives me some satisfaction, and meanwhile I am continuously adding to my stash of a raw material which has intriguing possibilities and costs me nothing!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">(recently updated with new work)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This year's Eastside Culture Crawl will take place November 20 - 23.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For details see <a href="http://www.culturecrawl.ca/">www.culturecrawl.ca</a> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-3323353799523720382014-09-23T22:07:00.000-07:002014-09-23T22:07:26.687-07:00Two from 2013: "Granville Bridge" and "Bend in the River"<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTZ0ItB3bv8Nu7pZXep_OvLL5UFrH3xzGLZd10n_HaXBN663CT_0dFLtxsSG619ZO9hRGRQGhQSZtXE1-Na7_GXll5VDuuXONKTmj8ZazWUcc_dybikJEB3-6_wTFmMZWT61xaFg8nqQzX/s1600/Bridge+on+the+Lydd+2010+11x14.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTZ0ItB3bv8Nu7pZXep_OvLL5UFrH3xzGLZd10n_HaXBN663CT_0dFLtxsSG619ZO9hRGRQGhQSZtXE1-Na7_GXll5VDuuXONKTmj8ZazWUcc_dybikJEB3-6_wTFmMZWT61xaFg8nqQzX/s1600/Bridge+on+the+Lydd+2010+11x14.jpg" height="156" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bridge on the Lydd - </i>acrylic - 11" x 14" - 2010</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">When I painted <i>Bridge on the Lydd</i> four years ago</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">(Please see this blog, September 2011) I was primarily concerned with painting a landscape that included reflections in water. The bridge figured prominently in the composition, but did not interest me more than the trees and rocks and reeds. Apart from the gently rippled water there is no movement in this picture: it is a static, peaceful scene.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In 2013 The Vancouver Sketch Club chose "Bridges" as the theme for a group show. My contributions were a view of Granville Bridge<i>, </i>one of three bridges spanning False Creek and linking Vancouver's Downtown with the rest of the city; and <i>Bend in the River</i>, which depicts a bridge over the Lune, just outside Kirkby Lonsdale in Northern England. Like <i>Bridge on the Lydd, </i>these paintings are landscapes of a kind, but this time with a man made structure as the main focus. As I worked on the paintings and developed the image of each bridge and its surroundings, I was surprised how often I found myself thinking about <b>movement. </b>The bridges just stood there, stable and stationary, but these paintings seemed to be about motion, arrested, contained or implied.<i> </i> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Constructing a bridge, even the most basic--a plank thrown across a stream--implies that you want to <b>go </b>somewhere, and that there is an obstacle that you have to go over or under to get there. Usually there is movement in two directions, often running at right angles: cars go over, trains go under. Or the trains go over and pedestrians go under. Or boats go under, or a fast-flowing stream goes under, or water in an aqueduct goes over . . . and there's a little bridge in Queen Elizabeth Park where my children and I used to act out the story of the Billy Goats Gruff. My little goats would trit-trot across the bridge while I lurked underneath waiting for my big moment: Up jumped the TROLL! Delighted screams!</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1amDa-BOTck9n8KaeMksxY9d8zEYWdccNl0klmhhKSKloh4IriVHSumzamAjpoKqBpnJziwl5t95RYtr2NyrC_UuaYG8jMfdS66ufowRxBdCjH5y3S7hjseBQ8CtvL1o8vRI8siz7IkdJ/s1600/Granville+Island+sketcher+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1amDa-BOTck9n8KaeMksxY9d8zEYWdccNl0klmhhKSKloh4IriVHSumzamAjpoKqBpnJziwl5t95RYtr2NyrC_UuaYG8jMfdS66ufowRxBdCjH5y3S7hjseBQ8CtvL1o8vRI8siz7IkdJ/s1600/Granville+Island+sketcher+2.jpg" height="143" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Granville Island sketcher - photo</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Granville Bridge is a utilitarian structure of no great charm, heavily used by commuters on their way to work and home again. It's a main artery into Vancouver's business district, and crossing it feels like driving a stretch of highway. Side views are scarcely more inspiring. Much more interesting are the spaces underneath, and the worm's eye view of the bridge from far below. At the south end the bridge passes over Granville Island, popular with both tourists and locals for its market, galleries, cottage industries, children's amenities, and green spaces. There one idyllic summer morning, under a tree and beside a pond, I settled down to draw with some of my Sketch Club friends. I also took </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj48MMiXJ6l35Pe7Yh8GyrTtLXe8C75ZINZ3HJMwEi-Kvt67y0s_p4tXKPnoPxPvSrpQ3yp3J2Rx-hefDbsdv0_vZo-c0uDj6UQo_9V7jN7qByNwBviCTX7sjTM39ySihk68__CkMVrN7vA/s1600/Granville+Bridge.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj48MMiXJ6l35Pe7Yh8GyrTtLXe8C75ZINZ3HJMwEi-Kvt67y0s_p4tXKPnoPxPvSrpQ3yp3J2Rx-hefDbsdv0_vZo-c0uDj6UQo_9V7jN7qByNwBviCTX7sjTM39ySihk68__CkMVrN7vA/s1600/Granville+Bridge.jpg" height="200" width="174" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Granville Bridge - ink</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuUTDf4QoXfNUQ9tberPk_GAoCHKxOU4WGcTCoNNR9MhbTyF2mzZ58pCnc0jQFptc16LH6loPAKxfWml8AvZCG9eSPYItcBdTwgiq1RI7ckXTkB0ijXbwNub5QDhnocN1U8o7s8QC41LUm/s1600/Sketcher,+Granville+Island.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuUTDf4QoXfNUQ9tberPk_GAoCHKxOU4WGcTCoNNR9MhbTyF2mzZ58pCnc0jQFptc16LH6loPAKxfWml8AvZCG9eSPYItcBdTwgiq1RI7ckXTkB0ijXbwNub5QDhnocN1U8o7s8QC41LUm/s1600/Sketcher,+Granville+Island.jpg" height="200" width="176" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sketcher - ink</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">photographs, and later, in the studio, painted <i>Granville Bridge.<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbIwxk593KCw2SihQ1P_lhWvOlwWaPhm0O-PyxzVJWIaKXt_1LC3ewzS4pAhbD8G6TRP8RM3RK9YC0IBlAB1r1IxmtzcCsly6zkhKnN1Jy-gICw2DYDEYXHPlOnlrdMSovSGaaC6OIq7q5/s1600/Granville+Bridge+16x16+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbIwxk593KCw2SihQ1P_lhWvOlwWaPhm0O-PyxzVJWIaKXt_1LC3ewzS4pAhbD8G6TRP8RM3RK9YC0IBlAB1r1IxmtzcCsly6zkhKnN1Jy-gICw2DYDEYXHPlOnlrdMSovSGaaC6OIq7q5/s1600/Granville+Bridge+16x16+2013.jpg" height="319" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><i>Granville Bridge</i> - acrylic - 16" x 16" - 2013</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">From this angle the bridge acquires a certain grandeur, due to the immense height of those concrete supports. But why did I keep thinking about <b>movement? </b>I know nothing about civil engineering, but I was very much aware of the downward thrust of the verticals--I could <b>feel</b> them boring deep into the earth--and the upward leap of the bridge deck. The movement seemed barely held in check. It reminded me of a story I'd once read about a bridge that couldn't withstand the tremendous pressures and tensions and sprang apart like an overstretched rubber band.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">A bit of research informed me that the bridge disaster I was thinking of was fictional, but I discovered that Wikipedia has a remarkable, and very long, list of bridge failures going back to the Middle Ages: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_bridge_failures">en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_bridge_failures</a> . As I scanned the list I began to think it's a miracle that any bridges hold up, and that's a scary thought in a city like Vancouver, which is hard to get out of without crossing water. It's true that we've had only minor earth tremors in the fifty-odd years I've lived here, but there's that Big One waiting to strike. Granville Bridge was opened in 1954, and has been seismically upgraded. I hope it's enough: that's one kind of bridge movement I don't want to see.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">My second bridge painting is based on a photo I took when visiting a friend in Kirkby Lonsdale. It was not a promising day for walking around sight-seeing: the sky was moody, threatening rain at any moment.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQ9O5sd91YU1sXGFtXJOdK0KJMdIwwWsUwWIrOOt0nlEkzJ3hfDVGo0p3_n4Gl7SwSm_f53h7aBfaLQg4bwNc6NyBQkampeGRYcVH9zUk4-zjELBkib3VqCcJNMbaGvI65vhLqQEjIjo38/s1600/Bend+in+the+River+16x16+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQ9O5sd91YU1sXGFtXJOdK0KJMdIwwWsUwWIrOOt0nlEkzJ3hfDVGo0p3_n4Gl7SwSm_f53h7aBfaLQg4bwNc6NyBQkampeGRYcVH9zUk4-zjELBkib3VqCcJNMbaGvI65vhLqQEjIjo38/s1600/Bend+in+the+River+16x16+2013.jpg" height="318" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bend in the River</i> - acrylic - 16" x 16" - 2013</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I called this painting <i>Bend in the River </i>because this time the movement which interested me--and was a challenge to paint--was the turbulent rush of the water as it rounded the corner.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">At the time I photographed the scene I knew nothing about the bridge, and it wasn't until yesterday, when it occurred to me to try to find out its age, that I learned that it has quite a story. It's called Devil's Bridge, and according to legend was built by the Evil One himself, but only after he was tricked by an old woman. The price for building the bridge was the first soul to cross it; but the old woman threw a piece of bread across and sent her dog to retrieve it. The devil got only a canine soul, but evidently kept his side of the bargain. Since the bridge dates from around 1370 it has seen a great amount of traffic back and forth since the unfortunate dog's inaugural crossing, but it has been closed to motor traffic since 1932. A nondescript new bridge replaced it, only a short distance away and visible under the central arch of Devil's Bridge. In my painting I concealed it behind some trees.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span> Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-41983130916753667982014-08-12T22:06:00.000-07:002014-08-12T22:06:41.530-07:00The Objects Fight Back: Abstraction and Fantasy<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">First of all, many thanks to those people--you know who you are--who have gently reminded me over the past few months that it's a long time since I added to my blog, and have indicated that you would like me to write some more. Belatedly, here is my first post of 2014. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXB23zVw5TCLZY-_i-obZzuBgZtu1rjhz82kfS6SlNKe74EitWLQYrulFh5PAL_tXdC7pyMCnRkbYmqvsWMzl-VivT-jnNb1u91MiXt2605XmQG3qv5UxHFyIMbFo5rclZppouQQc-uh_O/s1600/Key+rack.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXB23zVw5TCLZY-_i-obZzuBgZtu1rjhz82kfS6SlNKe74EitWLQYrulFh5PAL_tXdC7pyMCnRkbYmqvsWMzl-VivT-jnNb1u91MiXt2605XmQG3qv5UxHFyIMbFo5rclZppouQQc-uh_O/s1600/Key+rack.jpg" height="111" width="200" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_OfD3atppKpn_icIjUoOwoohSST2e0cmX6ERobCRCrn0CQ2sC4BAewEo2-gAETiTwDVDiFRinbQTgLR7F_K4H-6mziYgiXJlrpylfB5hjP1XqX8qj_mgMQ2vBd2RgHOry2EYffLu6t18E/s1600/Seals.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_OfD3atppKpn_icIjUoOwoohSST2e0cmX6ERobCRCrn0CQ2sC4BAewEo2-gAETiTwDVDiFRinbQTgLR7F_K4H-6mziYgiXJlrpylfB5hjP1XqX8qj_mgMQ2vBd2RgHOry2EYffLu6t18E/s1600/Seals.jpg" height="200" width="120" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Most of my painting time in 2013 was taken up with experiments in abstraction (please see blog posts of October and November.) At the end of the year I was left with two unfinished canvases that leaned accusingly against the wall and demanded attention. I had started both of them in the same workshop on Intuitive Painting</span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">that produced my "Images of War" series. The instructor had asked participants in the workshop to bring three objects. I turned up with an apple made of wood, a soapstone carving of two seals, and an iron key rack depicting two human figures carrying fish. I can't remember why I chose those particular items, except that they are all treasured possessions, but I do recall wanting representations of living or organic things that were not actually very realistic. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAUZHMtQg7dUMVSMVfxC2RHV_KoF9yziQ0jiyJsKhpsP4uHZ6qnnnAEb7gNYBpMBQG7WcTlYH_AGXtd71srWtObGeJzmOxAmGg8qYEBkIMcm6W9a67akL1GMWJoNso1RQgXExbyWyW7yc3/s1600/Wooden+apple.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAUZHMtQg7dUMVSMVfxC2RHV_KoF9yziQ0jiyJsKhpsP4uHZ6qnnnAEb7gNYBpMBQG7WcTlYH_AGXtd71srWtObGeJzmOxAmGg8qYEBkIMcm6W9a67akL1GMWJoNso1RQgXExbyWyW7yc3/s1600/Wooden+apple.jpg" height="200" width="199" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There was a catch, though. At the workshop we were asked to swap one of our objects with another student. With a pang I let go of my smooth, shiny apple and acquired instead a posable model dog, another object that was recognizable but certainly not realistic. In fact,</span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj928u58n1Cu9k_KlicXeGNpEzTu4za2db1WXYe2KkdoqBLkjZRceFLBDMH27z_rkoW8jrWNJbyEPbSt81kw6FhLl0rNWGS4p6G_AhRUky8yGjufNncgJ41il4_glz_bOvDII0G1-SxJk3L/s1600/Dog.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj928u58n1Cu9k_KlicXeGNpEzTu4za2db1WXYe2KkdoqBLkjZRceFLBDMH27z_rkoW8jrWNJbyEPbSt81kw6FhLl0rNWGS4p6G_AhRUky8yGjufNncgJ41il4_glz_bOvDII0G1-SxJk3L/s1600/Dog.jpg" height="181" width="200" /></a> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">in size, colour,</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">material</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">and detailing</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> all four objects were nothing like</span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">the originals, though they weren't much abstracted, either. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Our instructor, artist Eri Ishii, then wanted us to make a composition of our three objects, working intuitively and not being too concerned with realism. I produced two paintings, neither of which Iooked finished and neither of which impressed me as something I wanted to keep. Unfortunately I did not take a photograph of the first effort, and have only the vaguest memory of it. I do remember that it had some awkward straight lines derived from the edges of the table on which the objects were arranged. I did photograph my second attempt, after fiddling with it a bit more after the workshop. This is what it looked like:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB0VMNB40tgxuM7Gu84sWRBoKF2FTDCfdBmRPXY3CsYxykI-oN1IAqNj1Aw6FXrS1Lfa-3q7FTldMFLfruIr9sUXhYTN2bQgG4LBwuQz0OGRH68QwYaTHrBnRkPczbX97FjyokDuoIJf-q/s1600/IMG_1565.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB0VMNB40tgxuM7Gu84sWRBoKF2FTDCfdBmRPXY3CsYxykI-oN1IAqNj1Aw6FXrS1Lfa-3q7FTldMFLfruIr9sUXhYTN2bQgG4LBwuQz0OGRH68QwYaTHrBnRkPczbX97FjyokDuoIJf-q/s1600/IMG_1565.JPG" height="239" width="320" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The seals are easily recognizable, and in a way the dog is too, though I couldn't help thinking it looked more like a human figure with its hands over its ears in a "hear no evil" pose. The little fish are peeking out from under the base of the dog model, but the fishermen have disappeared. The painting is weird, and I'm not sure about the sizzling hot colours, but part of me wonders why I didn't just accept it as a bit of surrealism . . . or else plough it under and reuse the canvas.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Anyway, that's not what happened. After almost a year the two paintings were still leaning against the wall, challenging me to <b>do</b> something. In the case of the one pictured above I eliminated the platform to which the dog was attached, so that the amorous seals, which had been awkwardly perched on a sort of diving-board, were now resting on a flat surface, and the fishermen with their catch emerged into full view. I also got rid of the hot colours and modified the background shapes. Finished product:</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihISoHF_QfDWG4wkttJuOhVLd5lUzz_GlONNkB9r7L00DdAO2ADvwAFxkr_Fxa9WofezGgQRg6teoIPIG00EvQjWKZPNH9L7_Voowyj8vJGzLl0HuKjindKa4og0gBsOVraspR0Fgh9FJv/s1600/Meeting+of+3+objects+18x24+2014.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihISoHF_QfDWG4wkttJuOhVLd5lUzz_GlONNkB9r7L00DdAO2ADvwAFxkr_Fxa9WofezGgQRg6teoIPIG00EvQjWKZPNH9L7_Voowyj8vJGzLl0HuKjindKa4og0gBsOVraspR0Fgh9FJv/s1600/Meeting+of+3+objects+18x24+2014.jpg" height="236" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Meeting of Three Objects - </i>acrylic - 18" x 24" - 2014</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Did I improve it, or did I lose something important in the reworking? I can't decide. Your opinion is welcomed!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The other painting is much more abstract and very little of the original still life remains. You can still distinguish the shapes of the dog and the seals, but the key rack is gone, apart from a schematic reference to the hooks--the elongated feet of the fishermen. The other shapes evolved from areas of negative space. I moved things around and overpainted, much as I did with my "Intuitions" series of 2013. The assemblage of shapes seems to be floating through space.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGB3pzThvZ5YD0Uj6yyE6V7TqL3HDr3rlW3HwOgjkZmvzJ0cM0RaIgR8FsSqFNm-RWCDKapX67cHikf5qzkUH8oLHNWOkyHMPIUI-Ng0sGc1vpRHL-KFgXmtuheacekHuXfmbkEyDdoATu/s1600/Abstraction+from+3+objects+16x20+2014.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGB3pzThvZ5YD0Uj6yyE6V7TqL3HDr3rlW3HwOgjkZmvzJ0cM0RaIgR8FsSqFNm-RWCDKapX67cHikf5qzkUH8oLHNWOkyHMPIUI-Ng0sGc1vpRHL-KFgXmtuheacekHuXfmbkEyDdoATu/s1600/Abstraction+from+3+objects+16x20+2014.jpg" height="254" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Abstraction from Three Objects - </i>acrylic - 16" x 20" - 2014</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The other day I found a reusable frame lying around and tried it on this painting. This will give you an idea:</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy-5rguPyh7XhVddETRi0IdPWwztcI58Axlu34r5uSh_mvqkVqGEaQqI_onNJHi6ymHtTHmCtp4DPERwDEJCC7eBDQsfrUP1m7f6U6lLokyBDWg95fw66axE9_B70qhFcVqrte19U2lT_h/s1600/Abstraction+from+3+objects+16x20+2014+with+borders.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy-5rguPyh7XhVddETRi0IdPWwztcI58Axlu34r5uSh_mvqkVqGEaQqI_onNJHi6ymHtTHmCtp4DPERwDEJCC7eBDQsfrUP1m7f6U6lLokyBDWg95fw66axE9_B70qhFcVqrte19U2lT_h/s1600/Abstraction+from+3+objects+16x20+2014+with+borders.jpg" height="255" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Adding a frame somehow adds stature and authority to a painting. At any rate I liked <i>Abstraction from Three Objects </i>a lot more, and it occurred to me that it's rather a restful work and that the colours would go with the decor of my bedroom. So this Cinderella of a painting has found a home, at least for now. As for me, I'm sure I will continue to feel the gravitational pull of both realism and abstraction.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b>Two announcements</b>: My series of paintings "<b>The Sky Beneath</b>" is currently on display at the Tsawwasswen Arts Centre, 1172 56th St.. Delta. The show continues until August 29. I wrote about these paintings in this blog, April 12, 2012.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">My series "<b>Artists at Work</b>" will be on display at the West End Community Centre September 8 - 27. address: 870 Denman St., Vancouver. I wrote about this series November 13, 2012, but have added two more "artists" to the collection since then. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-68945493486280285302013-12-19T22:02:00.000-08:002013-12-19T22:02:05.976-08:00What to do with a View: Sketches, Photos and Ideas<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One reason I rent a studio space rather than painting in my kitchen, quite apart from the health and hygiene considerations, is to force myself to show up and paint. At home there are always distractions and excuses, whereas if I pay rent each month I have to justify the expense and <b>use </b>the place. Now I'm feeling much the same way about the panoramic views from my apartment: while I certainly enjoy just looking at them, it's not quite enough. If I call myself an artist I should be able to <b>use </b>the raw material outside. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi_sBtQDheVaIWCmkYfGPgh275E1aFOXuslbCnbimSIaP29SkzadATFDlLt-gtXyg4vAHwO3zBdYnxjxcpy0cKSvn_8oMn-51h8aHRGHX2C3AH7VLf5tQhJZCf6cqzFKZu080PviYGVI2J/s1600/01.+31.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi_sBtQDheVaIWCmkYfGPgh275E1aFOXuslbCnbimSIaP29SkzadATFDlLt-gtXyg4vAHwO3zBdYnxjxcpy0cKSvn_8oMn-51h8aHRGHX2C3AH7VLf5tQhJZCf6cqzFKZu080PviYGVI2J/s200/01.+31.JPG" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My former home had "peekaboo views" between the houses. In 2011 I set myself the task of taking a photograph every morning through the same gap, where on clear days Mt. Baker's volcanic peak poked up.The sunrise pictures, such as this one from late January, were the most dramatic . . . but more often than not the mountain's face was veiled, so I called the series "Mt. Baker or Not." I kept it up for a whole year, except when I was away from home.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Last winter I moved to an eighth floor apartment with unobstructed views not just of Mt. Baker, the highest and most distant peak, but, working from east to west, the Golden Ears, Seymour, Grouse, the Lions, and Hollyburn, along with many others that I can't name. And on days when I the weather obscures them all, six immense cranes dominate the scene.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Looking directly north I see the eastern side of Grouse, with its ski slopes at present waiting for more snow. I can just about distinguish the line of chair lift supports--easier at night, when they are lit up. Moving down, I see forested hillsides and the buildings of North Vancouver. Then in the middle distance the view gets really complicated, with docks on both sides of the inlet. Massive structures and loading machinery overlap each other and present weird perspectives. It's hard to tell what's on land and what's on the water. Activity continues day and night, and things change shape and position. Freighters, tugs and barges come and go, stacks of containers form and re-form, and the orange cranes regroup themselves and raise and lower their necks, more like giraffes than their avian namesakes. Closer to home the view becomes less picturesque. The neighbourhood is mixed, with a coastal strip of concrete jungle giving way to residential streets higher up.There's an expanse of unattractive flat roofs, and then finally, if I direct my gaze straight down, a discarded armchair or broken table in the alley--right beside a conspicuous "NO DUMPING" sign.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I considered doing a photographic project similar to "Mt. Baker or Not", but didn't want to restrict myself to one spot. And I didn't want to accumulate thousands more photos, either. Instead I resolved to do a daily drawing, selecting whatever section of view appealed to me at the time, and setting a timer so I didn't spend all day on it. I provided myself with a variety of non-dusty drawing materials (mess stays at the studio) and decided to put on a different CD each day as a change from working in silence.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">This all sounded fine . . . until I actually sat down to do it. Faced with something like this:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEignZoLJSJlqvy25yMQUZLDFbnqrDsWQfd5mV8Qk-0cYX3lytbcqKx2BNguTtQf_kJCcVsuH9UFUajPKdDJ6F8xja_sCEiMIg07hoSSqQ6AwROKh9Fe4zzkqyTKI-yWLFDvDtwFR2cY_H5d/s1600/View+N.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEignZoLJSJlqvy25yMQUZLDFbnqrDsWQfd5mV8Qk-0cYX3lytbcqKx2BNguTtQf_kJCcVsuH9UFUajPKdDJ6F8xja_sCEiMIg07hoSSqQ6AwROKh9Fe4zzkqyTKI-yWLFDvDtwFR2cY_H5d/s320/View+N.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">how on earth was I to draw it? And that's just if I look straight north. There are also the views to west and east . . .</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY6eTtkKlJTfhpgMNfXBQE9y5iUbZ3a3znl3LdIHFlb1WJgxwqHFvcvCyBSTW_-IoaYf0JcOYq8JkU-KyqAcyQavbTeQRlxNarBmX4XTwBkTAPgvM_ysSy_yesUkmVgKJIgN-TsBmkvPwI/s1600/Nov.+21+NNE.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY6eTtkKlJTfhpgMNfXBQE9y5iUbZ3a3znl3LdIHFlb1WJgxwqHFvcvCyBSTW_-IoaYf0JcOYq8JkU-KyqAcyQavbTeQRlxNarBmX4XTwBkTAPgvM_ysSy_yesUkmVgKJIgN-TsBmkvPwI/s320/Nov.+21+NNE.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cheerful in felt pen.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br />Anyway, I made a start, and have been at it a month, though I haven't come close to the daily drawing I intended. I quickly discovered that e</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">ven a small chunk of the view is overwhelming if I try to draw all the details. I have to remind myself that I'm not preparing engineering drawings, and that, as I wrote myself (this blog, August 2012) a sketch is just a sketch and doesn't have to be a masterpiece.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF1btOKDWDuvgMRwhpBUedsrzM6OtEBG6CNOUPbKNRe78chK1VgJp_Gm3dIlMbuDATuBBfhSE84h_uoWEXxiL99Irvj-peprBaqZbMvZOsiJ5I93rd7H8eCDSYmNU9Gs0dytsVbEtwiOLb/s1600/Dec.+11+NNE.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF1btOKDWDuvgMRwhpBUedsrzM6OtEBG6CNOUPbKNRe78chK1VgJp_Gm3dIlMbuDATuBBfhSE84h_uoWEXxiL99Irvj-peprBaqZbMvZOsiJ5I93rd7H8eCDSYmNU9Gs0dytsVbEtwiOLb/s320/Dec.+11+NNE.jpg" width="227" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Best effort so far</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisupNdApiDCXxjuOkAXh0rohDyJvFDwHd6x6dn2-OKEWtRPvzoCX930A_yC6LfW4N5DCDZBgDerI3L29uoHf-PZTAkSNbHpy4UtARcEjBgFJaZAyofvG-Bbc-okEqSeQRDqbMttPhMLVyZ/s1600/Dec.+2+Lions+and+Cranes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="139" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisupNdApiDCXxjuOkAXh0rohDyJvFDwHd6x6dn2-OKEWtRPvzoCX930A_yC6LfW4N5DCDZBgDerI3L29uoHf-PZTAkSNbHpy4UtARcEjBgFJaZAyofvG-Bbc-okEqSeQRDqbMttPhMLVyZ/s200/Dec.+2+Lions+and+Cranes.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cranes and Lions</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJDpXUAqfhdb-stQbxbUxqguXv1DI7QZ7aG-Sx36Tt180BPISbI3osrsiH8iZHH4dxZh-5jOSMCWbs_CsQUF5DIJJYIGXOiqrMj7IoMILf1vdzV2CLF0LGwGat711ieFnCJmMMoNVhxKKJ/s1600/Dec.+4+NNW.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="141" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJDpXUAqfhdb-stQbxbUxqguXv1DI7QZ7aG-Sx36Tt180BPISbI3osrsiH8iZHH4dxZh-5jOSMCWbs_CsQUF5DIJJYIGXOiqrMj7IoMILf1vdzV2CLF0LGwGat711ieFnCJmMMoNVhxKKJ/s200/Dec.+4+NNW.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Looking NNW</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The most interesting aspects of my view are also too far away for me to make much sense of them, so accurate rendering is impossible. Squiggly marks to <b>suggest</b> what's going on are one way to deal with this problem and can be surprisingly effective. Another approach would be to study areas of interest through binoculars, but it's an extremely laborious way to draw, and physically exhausting too. I certainly wouldn't have the stamina to do a whole painting that way!</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh71GdgIarEL30oiQnBn5tbFvnPl9rMfviX4F1WfY1hChJotlE6d-roGB9FIQW0yD9Z3nymu_zJ9ZMzIGHP8-cxpPx_tp-z31Da9qjuS1f5QTaWzmiLIEnq2VeAc3kg6oF2qKa-4vRQlOnf/s1600/Cranes+in+the+mist.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="178" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh71GdgIarEL30oiQnBn5tbFvnPl9rMfviX4F1WfY1hChJotlE6d-roGB9FIQW0yD9Z3nymu_zJ9ZMzIGHP8-cxpPx_tp-z31Da9qjuS1f5QTaWzmiLIEnq2VeAc3kg6oF2qKa-4vRQlOnf/s200/Cranes+in+the+mist.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">All of this seems to be leading me back to painting from photographs. That way I can zoom in bits of the view that interest me (I could do with a better camera) and enlarge the detail enough to paint it convincingly. Then I could do something like this crane in process of being lowered, or the group of four with their heads in the clouds:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPb7v4ARRC-k1ZQHvOKgN7X6Bwe_N-yQKSWcFCRuOaMP2q0vBr-DtVSPOwTnC0y2_YYTcImv3gHZjS3e3hj5OexDJ3hIrMRL-CPneQCR62BsImNihk64pr6fIvcG1fUVf9ZcD__GeKbffK/s1600/Detail+of+crane.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPb7v4ARRC-k1ZQHvOKgN7X6Bwe_N-yQKSWcFCRuOaMP2q0vBr-DtVSPOwTnC0y2_YYTcImv3gHZjS3e3hj5OexDJ3hIrMRL-CPneQCR62BsImNihk64pr6fIvcG1fUVf9ZcD__GeKbffK/s200/Detail+of+crane.jpg" width="160" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">My researches through my living-room window have given me plenty of ideas for 2014. This blog will continue, probably erratically, so I'll be reporting on my progress. In the meantime, merry Christmas to all my readers, and thanks again for your interest.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div>
Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-73731180228299810402013-11-19T23:21:00.001-08:002013-11-19T23:21:37.638-08:00Divide and Conquer: Cutting up the Canvas<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sometimes, despite my best efforts, I can't make a composition work. Usually it will hang around for a long time, nagging at me to <b>do</b> something, until, to rid myself of the frustration, I'll gesso over the canvas and re-use it. Occasionally though, I like <b>parts </b>of the</span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">work enough to want to keep them, and I have had some success with cutting up the canvas and making several smaller paintings out of it. I've yet to try this with a representational painting--now that would be a challenge!--but I've done it several times with abstract work. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi35mS6IMes9FYQvnHM2-nvxbZ4o2rNCjq35CvzKJRllwMo8g-zAxq8H8YWXZTtnU3sLjB2_R0RjXO8wyJtxil3Hy4p1DueJrrDvR74xA3WAezy9_EB6M13TAjf2lyQZ1p-hvepraxV4jOx/s1600/Poem+4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="143" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi35mS6IMes9FYQvnHM2-nvxbZ4o2rNCjq35CvzKJRllwMo8g-zAxq8H8YWXZTtnU3sLjB2_R0RjXO8wyJtxil3Hy4p1DueJrrDvR74xA3WAezy9_EB6M13TAjf2lyQZ1p-hvepraxV4jOx/s200/Poem+4.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The first time I tried it was with a painting in which I tried to incorporate "windows" into an abstract composition. I never took a photo of it, so I can't show it here. I still like the idea of creating the illusion of looking through the painting at images underneath, and will return to it sometime; but in the case I'm describing the "windows" were the only parts that worked</span>, <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">so I cut all seven of them out, matted and framed them, and called them "Little Paint Poems." I still have three of them, having sold two and given two away as gifts. They are about 3" x 4" in size.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaUnxZyQqv1X-HMelgIzykPDT3o-eKFRXZ33tVDiNTI3-tsAv5B0qT-hcbaYvHJsiIOBroZ5gOj8J8PxU0-5EvY4dXK4Igj7-4K3mmE8MaDo_jeIJceliq_lbvHtSbV9xSwBCencBhDwPA/s1600/Poem+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="148" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaUnxZyQqv1X-HMelgIzykPDT3o-eKFRXZ33tVDiNTI3-tsAv5B0qT-hcbaYvHJsiIOBroZ5gOj8J8PxU0-5EvY4dXK4Igj7-4K3mmE8MaDo_jeIJceliq_lbvHtSbV9xSwBCencBhDwPA/s200/Poem+3.jpg" width="200" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivJdIWAQ_RvZXMj5rKXcTnQSKbHCqk1j5ftjYOdPnQZ_Dcra18Lzv2norpUuqUne0Kc57Ji1VVZhG5pIxs0diHY_VHkRFnjZyMD_NGAz7hbt4ShPOO9Rp7ojpq0P6aZlFnzJu6hTJj5GrD/s1600/Poem+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivJdIWAQ_RvZXMj5rKXcTnQSKbHCqk1j5ftjYOdPnQZ_Dcra18Lzv2norpUuqUne0Kc57Ji1VVZhG5pIxs0diHY_VHkRFnjZyMD_NGAz7hbt4ShPOO9Rp7ojpq0P6aZlFnzJu6hTJj5GrD/s200/Poem+2.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In this case the parent painting never got finished. I tinkered away at it but gave up. The next time I took scissors to canvas was rather different: I felt the painting was finished, and I put a frame on it and hung it on my wall. But somehow I wasn't satisfied with it.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL5467qPfceo_JIEEi5pKJw_bQj4VP6zUtGap7akjnfWqKYgc5zcjsDhAHx1ZFqJTT2hVpC826DqrQ55w-WXagyHOhFXN22uMuGuzow16dZll57NhPwi2sd3loKPM3AB6Hik61tBut9nKp/s1600/From+the+Floor.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL5467qPfceo_JIEEi5pKJw_bQj4VP6zUtGap7akjnfWqKYgc5zcjsDhAHx1ZFqJTT2hVpC826DqrQ55w-WXagyHOhFXN22uMuGuzow16dZll57NhPwi2sd3loKPM3AB6Hik61tBut9nKp/s320/From+the+Floor.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>From the Floor</i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I called it "From the Floor" because it was a more or less accurate rendering of paint spatters on the studio floor. This was the assignment set on the first evening of a course on abstract painting at Langara College. It wasn't until later that I noticed that the shapes suggested sea creatures, an idea that influenced my selection of bits to cut out and keep, and the titles I gave them.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIeGDiJw-V6PjQYq9P8rWrKqO1TPTYxTr9MblLOeolyKQPCWREr79qHRbU5E_CjVavbhLMxlZzTQYghUpdRZ12OU11dQ-iOaFSG1U5nTq4TyJAIaM5gL5PkMbVb2gBGmEvDytOJzSnWXM_/s1600/Marine+Abstraction+2+10x8+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIeGDiJw-V6PjQYq9P8rWrKqO1TPTYxTr9MblLOeolyKQPCWREr79qHRbU5E_CjVavbhLMxlZzTQYghUpdRZ12OU11dQ-iOaFSG1U5nTq4TyJAIaM5gL5PkMbVb2gBGmEvDytOJzSnWXM_/s320/Marine+Abstraction+2+10x8+2010.jpg" width="252" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Marine Abstraction 2</i> - 14" x 10" - 2010 </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFvgmtT4dzlI9QG7legOON6fpspmS80DtOpQpfzZT1mPTA3kz16iPxB8nE_dJbhYDV4E3x9sAgusqFc3InWXFtITwAy2PP5kSoT5wsWbyMyW53d5fPmtXYwcEJlxbdK7v0S9KS5bUZzd-i/s1600/Marine+Abstraction+1+10x8+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFvgmtT4dzlI9QG7legOON6fpspmS80DtOpQpfzZT1mPTA3kz16iPxB8nE_dJbhYDV4E3x9sAgusqFc3InWXFtITwAy2PP5kSoT5wsWbyMyW53d5fPmtXYwcEJlxbdK7v0S9KS5bUZzd-i/s320/Marine+Abstraction+1+10x8+2010.jpg" width="253" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Marine Abstraction 1 - </i>14" x 10" - 2010<i><br /></i></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i> </i></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i> </i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I found a pair of rich-looking gold-painted frames that set off my marine fantasies very nicely, and I sold them soon afterwards.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">And so to this year, when I participated in a two-day workshop on intuitive painting with artist Eri Ishii. We were asked to use various non-traditional tools (not brushes) and just two or three colours to make marks on unstretched canvas. This is my rather messy effort:</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjk8ntEWgtdZdp0HuB1Q7CJ3zV_hbL2urWp_-gCZ8JBog1pZj2OlCVU8VtvB12cA7J880V80DYODRKYDmyHeeW9vJrw8HNUZffA2Um4rFPtD4iaP2OmvaOlffWmZyRwaLI4KxYil6AkfKCP/s1600/Battlefield+2013.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjk8ntEWgtdZdp0HuB1Q7CJ3zV_hbL2urWp_-gCZ8JBog1pZj2OlCVU8VtvB12cA7J880V80DYODRKYDmyHeeW9vJrw8HNUZffA2Um4rFPtD4iaP2OmvaOlffWmZyRwaLI4KxYil6AkfKCP/s400/Battlefield+2013.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPH7IInPHNwqDZcPhn950Hkyo3NgvYxK5N_r9YcVCZB9Q9dymSuelRfZX9Nng8a0Foa16WCI4oTmX1NzPlyiuBOHdpCgfay0Cif0ksUetOpA5lsSpOyVNaM7AkpSeYzWSY2TMv1FM6s64h/s1600/Battlefield+4+8x8+2013+8x8+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPH7IInPHNwqDZcPhn950Hkyo3NgvYxK5N_r9YcVCZB9Q9dymSuelRfZX9Nng8a0Foa16WCI4oTmX1NzPlyiuBOHdpCgfay0Cif0ksUetOpA5lsSpOyVNaM7AkpSeYzWSY2TMv1FM6s64h/s200/Battlefield+4+8x8+2013+8x8+2013.jpg" width="196" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Perhaps because of the sombre colours I chose, or else because of the dreary weather that day, I felt almost immediately that my painting represented a battlefield. These were melancholy images of war. They didn't form a composition, but they were powerful. So again I selected bits, and produced four small paintings. I wanted rough edges, so instead of using scissors I tore the canvas, and glued the pieces on to 8" square white panels.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3Gc2Je40eWckWdod8YvJuMlofYMNEoEdWn_UtpE-IlfxVVBnltLosGkCeCZI46w-0coeAsYs7iSXFf-FRGlr5SLNXLG-z6Y032M8kg7o4YIxQsgi_FQhCGMxqF6t-ZvqAkO3pOa2UMAHW/s1600/Battlefield+2+8x8+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3Gc2Je40eWckWdod8YvJuMlofYMNEoEdWn_UtpE-IlfxVVBnltLosGkCeCZI46w-0coeAsYs7iSXFf-FRGlr5SLNXLG-z6Y032M8kg7o4YIxQsgi_FQhCGMxqF6t-ZvqAkO3pOa2UMAHW/s200/Battlefield+2+8x8+2013.jpg" width="198" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhNTVLuQ9gn9bCrK-E1RSR07IaN0KXKA9cvdFUndodAT-1W8OAEVQ-zUid8GYm6dXSmlmUb4axQf0EHWs0FoPvcafiTcjwbqEAwITyWNBcCDeGEsafP1_oE5czYwqLVOpMRVWTCd21EwPx/s1600/Battlefield+1+8x8+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhNTVLuQ9gn9bCrK-E1RSR07IaN0KXKA9cvdFUndodAT-1W8OAEVQ-zUid8GYm6dXSmlmUb4axQf0EHWs0FoPvcafiTcjwbqEAwITyWNBcCDeGEsafP1_oE5czYwqLVOpMRVWTCd21EwPx/s200/Battlefield+1+8x8+2013.jpg" width="198" /></a><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvS5Rt1hcEgjexfvw_Wf29WScqDTHrApd1aN_jAVA9p2k20ahH13Ke9DKC-1T9SwrYFJDuXsPbGKwDD21KQIFWxVwO4l-z-H4D8ev1MD6Tj2z2hi1YwVMyJBpQEHXk-lA7UvV0pJsN4wIR/s1600/Battlefield+3+8x8+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvS5Rt1hcEgjexfvw_Wf29WScqDTHrApd1aN_jAVA9p2k20ahH13Ke9DKC-1T9SwrYFJDuXsPbGKwDD21KQIFWxVwO4l-z-H4D8ev1MD6Tj2z2hi1YwVMyJBpQEHXk-lA7UvV0pJsN4wIR/s200/Battlefield+3+8x8+2013.jpg" width="199" /></a> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The course of editing, however, did not run smooth. I bought two of the panels from a craft shop, to see if my idea would work. Pleased with the first two paintings, I went back to buy more panels--but of course, I'd had the last two, and they were now discontinued. I tried all the Lower Mainland branches of the store, but with no success. I did track down two more at an art supplies store, but they weren't an exact match, and were quite different on the back, which made framing tricky. Ah, framing . . . I had one suitable black frame, but needed three more. I was delighted to find them all on the same shelf--no chasing around the region this time--but when I'd solved the problem of how to get the frames on to the two different kinds of panel, and hung the four paintings on the wall to admire them, they didn't seem quite right together. I stared at them in bewilderment, and then measured the frames. One of the new purchases was an exact match for the one I had, but the other two were slightly larger and deeper. I haven't yet had the heart to go shopping again.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghGOk7SH1BzpIPeu5C-4K2B-vU68d6wjRUa9NltAo2hvO9SgzKEkyk-akVGfmxm7EI_LQSEjMj46JH4BE9gxPeRep0saTR-7OhjBasgQb-8_LiVgZp9RXs2xD5s6TbXwp_VrGfxwGWVRjn/s1600/Four+Images+of+War+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="307" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghGOk7SH1BzpIPeu5C-4K2B-vU68d6wjRUa9NltAo2hvO9SgzKEkyk-akVGfmxm7EI_LQSEjMj46JH4BE9gxPeRep0saTR-7OhjBasgQb-8_LiVgZp9RXs2xD5s6TbXwp_VrGfxwGWVRjn/s320/Four+Images+of+War+2013.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Four Images of War - </i>2013</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span></div>
Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-72157763855455092232013-10-18T21:09:00.001-07:002013-10-18T21:09:28.275-07:00Call of the Abstract: Truth or Lies?<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwkPJ_kShKvtIy8X5zJF_Ct2Zqa18dbUMXB0GmTVw-73DYIq-zLU5exyFyh0MqIHVmCAkR3sy9xO_fdl_09D_q_yl6Gg16MP8nFqoV2mRacq_lgUn4Pn4SSGdDlWGjw1sshV_pQEEewjvO/s1600/Galaxy+1999.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwkPJ_kShKvtIy8X5zJF_Ct2Zqa18dbUMXB0GmTVw-73DYIq-zLU5exyFyh0MqIHVmCAkR3sy9xO_fdl_09D_q_yl6Gg16MP8nFqoV2mRacq_lgUn4Pn4SSGdDlWGjw1sshV_pQEEewjvO/s200/Galaxy+1999.jpg" width="196" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Galaxy </i>- acrylic - 17'x17" -1999</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Knowing that my painting activity this year was likely to be interrupted by trips to England to deal with family matters, I set myself a modest assignment: a series of small non-representational paintings on canvas boards. It had been a long time since I did any abstract painting--here's one example that I still like--<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">and it felt like the right time to try it again. I </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">had learned a lot from painting from photographs, but my last year's work--a series of artists painting or drawing ( Please see <i>Meet the Artists</i>, this blog, November 13, 2012) had taken me as far as I wanted to go in that direction. Apart from a pair of landscapes for a group show, all my painting time this year has been spent creating images that have no basis in reality and not even a mental picture as a starting point. Copying, whether from the real world or from photos, plays no part in this process. My initial intention with each new piece is simply to create . . . something. When it seems to be completed and I can sign and frame it, it is . . . what it is.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This all sounds nebulous and hard to defend. Yet I am certainly not breaking any new ground. Abstract painting is a hundred years old, and Jackson Pollock, perhaps the most famous--or notorious--of the American Abstract Expressionists, died in 1956! My modest little efforts are in the tradition of artists who sought to escape the limitations of realistic representation by creating something from scratch, with as little conscious forethought as possible. It sounds as if it ought to be easy, and occasionally it is; but my experience has been that, while nothing could be simpler than to produce a <b>bad </b>abstract work, creating a good one (and who's to say what that is, anyway?) is almost unbearably difficult. The problem is that there are no external reference points as there are with representational images. A building that won't stand up, water that flows uphill, clouds pasted on a sky . . . all look "wrong" in a landscape. And everyone has a mental picture of how people's faces and limbs should "go" --which is probably why Picasso's distortions continue to cause such bewilderment and derision. But in an abstract work there are no guidelines apart from one's intuitive sense of colour, composition, line, balance--the elements of painting.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Having decided that I needed to do the<b> </b>opposite of painting realistically, or even interpretively, from photos, I was looking for a way to get started when, as often happens, one fell into my lap. An artist called Anita Nairne came to a meeting of the Vancouver Sketch club to give a presentation on her approach to "Intuitive Painting." Anita had her audience members cover a surface with splotches and streaks of paint, working without thought or planning. Next we propped up each piece and studied it from a few feet away, turning the rectangle in all four directions and discussing what images we "saw" in the chaotic mess. The next step, after choosing the preferred orientation, is to pick out the images or shapes one wants to keep and develop, and outline them in chalk. These form the basis of the composition, which can then be completed however the artist wishes.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Anita is not an abstract artist, as you can see from the work on her website, <a href="http://www.anitanairne.com/">www.anitanairne.com</a> . However, I saw right away that her method could be applied to abstract shapes, and I began to try it. I used the leftover paint on my palette to daub on my first canvas board, with the results shown.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbOXRP84tFIB9ifVUHpmCgB_U3D0zcnohy7CTP8XJW41mHNXhEyI1t3SN5Ays6UqaHf07qUJVIoeBsHvcpyT9MbPMXICtOyTbZuGNOIzvKN7dRGROvX919Ufllkby7U7C7v5ph6rFRYRe8/s1600/1+View+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="153" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbOXRP84tFIB9ifVUHpmCgB_U3D0zcnohy7CTP8XJW41mHNXhEyI1t3SN5Ays6UqaHf07qUJVIoeBsHvcpyT9MbPMXICtOyTbZuGNOIzvKN7dRGROvX919Ufllkby7U7C7v5ph6rFRYRe8/s200/1+View+1.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">View 1</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgn7p7_0U3KeregIr7_d7KCx5OxkBN8kLTbLUaH0vKmSFBEm2YNyzFFFNQKwHYFRekyYe0HuP0DmcS4s2GYzKEz0fMGYm7T6n2jsu_fkf7BGPX19OTNVQa2BsPwsvne6Y_j7HEHAkZuoOi/s1600/1+View+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="156" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgn7p7_0U3KeregIr7_d7KCx5OxkBN8kLTbLUaH0vKmSFBEm2YNyzFFFNQKwHYFRekyYe0HuP0DmcS4s2GYzKEz0fMGYm7T6n2jsu_fkf7BGPX19OTNVQa2BsPwsvne6Y_j7HEHAkZuoOi/s200/1+View+3.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">View 2</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> I settled on View 2 and began a back-and-forth process of over-painting and redrawing as I tried to wrestle the raw beginnings into a finished product. I constantly heard in my head the voice of Lucy Hogg, one of my first painting instructors, as she exhorted her students to "listen to</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> the painting,</span>" <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">but to be very careful, because, she would add with a wicked little smile, "It will tell you <b>lies</b>!"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Any artist will tell you that one of the most difficult decisions is when to stop working on a painting, and I've found that even more of a challenge with this way of working. There's the constant danger of pushing the composition too far and losing what one liked about it before. Nevertheless, I do reach a point where I feel comfortable about quitting. My first "Intuition" ended up like this: </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhh6b-YQP5GHdGjgsGv2l5ktNDwAHY7YwchJwgft3I17uOIlJxbw90OAkTwjq7nBZ175JkiWKMHkCchtjXvAiVJu9680v6wv5uD4tEbumHsm9W8BStf9iU_djaoxSNR6vWx9DBOWmRJ723V/s1600/Intuition+1+11x14+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhh6b-YQP5GHdGjgsGv2l5ktNDwAHY7YwchJwgft3I17uOIlJxbw90OAkTwjq7nBZ175JkiWKMHkCchtjXvAiVJu9680v6wv5uD4tEbumHsm9W8BStf9iU_djaoxSNR6vWx9DBOWmRJ723V/s320/Intuition+1+11x14+2013.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Intuition 1 - </i>acrylic - 11"x14" - 2013</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> I decided not to give the paintings individual titles, even though I like naming things and some of the images are suggestive of living forms or of quasi-narratives. Just giving them numbers seems to liberate them from specific meaning and to give free rein to the imagination. Here are the next two, the same size as the first:</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU34e8o6IgPms_RIe4j6ceFMe4Ycck9WD_RO0fuF403DnOcPz7XjgOfeAIP53MZCCe0Qme7G8o85KQQJLqwvA6tNde09v0ypoLVFhcSplKh8KC-DGH5TGd-WVQHMgOv2sDtJjNCZ-4Dwjo/s1600/Intuition+2+11x14+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU34e8o6IgPms_RIe4j6ceFMe4Ycck9WD_RO0fuF403DnOcPz7XjgOfeAIP53MZCCe0Qme7G8o85KQQJLqwvA6tNde09v0ypoLVFhcSplKh8KC-DGH5TGd-WVQHMgOv2sDtJjNCZ-4Dwjo/s320/Intuition+2+11x14+2013.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Intuition 2 </i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSXJx4W08ebLVnRDNWFlDN-bTvQUix8t79-GlgrpyOkl2W3kiM7srDSXFq0cn1Uq1RSh_iMgQNepa3syz0P7K3ltlQbN_xEKLtHsqtyPQ9sjePO7Vqq2zaH_dHmQL72B9iEYrwyyjakDoV/s1600/Intuition+3+11x14+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="252" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSXJx4W08ebLVnRDNWFlDN-bTvQUix8t79-GlgrpyOkl2W3kiM7srDSXFq0cn1Uq1RSh_iMgQNepa3syz0P7K3ltlQbN_xEKLtHsqtyPQ9sjePO7Vqq2zaH_dHmQL72B9iEYrwyyjakDoV/s320/Intuition+3+11x14+2013.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Intuition 3 </i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKjeBNn0tFEGUVM3hUU5JGkS1gO9prbLjQm97FTcrxPPJ67oiEyoUocMqZQVAwI9fxSdkMMB2W6ekPE2euMbHM8KG5rbZNZCDoICy8OGap3J1FEozP_17EQL7SE5jnKFtmjrHCQF4AhZtW/s1600/Intuition+5+10x14+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="141" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKjeBNn0tFEGUVM3hUU5JGkS1gO9prbLjQm97FTcrxPPJ67oiEyoUocMqZQVAwI9fxSdkMMB2W6ekPE2euMbHM8KG5rbZNZCDoICy8OGap3J1FEozP_17EQL7SE5jnKFtmjrHCQF4AhZtW/s200/Intuition+5+10x14+2013.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Intuition 5</i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">At this point I made a mistake and bought a packet of boards that I thought were the same size but were in fact ten inches high instead of eleven. I am at present working on<i> Intuition</i> <i>9. </i>The process continues to be exasperating, time-consuming, and fascinating to the point of obsession. Each time I have absolutely no idea what the finished product will look like. Now I have them grouped together on the studio wall I am pleased with the effect. But I don't really know what to make of them. What do you think: are they telling me the truth, or lies?</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="140" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsoLpjCfbqECeTk1bQYcflghHH7sLYmivijhLyo0uvAzwUBbW3SO9dplAqlb2ccBsMQQ7s__0DNS6_F4ejAGu8blZp1m9KyexOAmPuiZE3KoyMW1jWFFqphlhCuGfmHo_PrrcbGe7BPMII/s200/Intuition+4+10x14+2013.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="200" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Intuition 4</i></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLInOARezV4ZPPWdTYlAqHIJZRsI0bFSciZ_8ocBZ4wPZlyUlKnObHRGUgU_80zVuRGA1L2QCvZPuf-hLbE7DMR9E7hhLxa6KXd-sKuzNdkRN1F2PuNcbZrcTfcBt32nl0cjuzzECE8x0B/s1600/Intuition+8+10x14+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="141" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLInOARezV4ZPPWdTYlAqHIJZRsI0bFSciZ_8ocBZ4wPZlyUlKnObHRGUgU_80zVuRGA1L2QCvZPuf-hLbE7DMR9E7hhLxa6KXd-sKuzNdkRN1F2PuNcbZrcTfcBt32nl0cjuzzECE8x0B/s200/Intuition+8+10x14+2013.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Intuition 8</i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKqcIctTlH5YZH-Uj9YzBVZLhKeXNfUrZ6ucgaXVwjCHgx06eFzgNUjjqFlkBClnkI2Rgbc8_WzToaZnC_m58XDhZZdE6hTdIOE1t23H2zYoihpeGLMiEYpr1hhENhryJXQgYO4_ch5ABn/s1600/Intuition+6+10x14+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="143" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKqcIctTlH5YZH-Uj9YzBVZLhKeXNfUrZ6ucgaXVwjCHgx06eFzgNUjjqFlkBClnkI2Rgbc8_WzToaZnC_m58XDhZZdE6hTdIOE1t23H2zYoihpeGLMiEYpr1hhENhryJXQgYO4_ch5ABn/s200/Intuition+6+10x14+2013.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Intuition 6</i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIqhKzkDkoLzbx6tsFVFa08D6DR8xZILa2UPbi6oIPgZqdTE1zkn0iKfXO3KM56jucc-HHUOG9Gwl7qlMlEfoZ6JJMAtDZVtjVJoPfRMnqC_AVuYvlPbFQW0L2qqRD9skWro-it9bMtJnP/s1600/Intuition+7+10x14+2013.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIqhKzkDkoLzbx6tsFVFa08D6DR8xZILa2UPbi6oIPgZqdTE1zkn0iKfXO3KM56jucc-HHUOG9Gwl7qlMlEfoZ6JJMAtDZVtjVJoPfRMnqC_AVuYvlPbFQW0L2qqRD9skWro-it9bMtJnP/s400/Intuition+7+10x14+2013.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Intuition 7 - </i>acrylic - 10"x14" - 2013</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div>
Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-21800594690067434422013-02-11T20:31:00.003-08:002013-02-11T20:31:58.450-08:00Apologies to Munch: "The Groan"<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Munch's <i>Scream </i>is one of our most familiar images, endlessly reproduced, parodied, reworked and commercialized, as well known as the<i> Mona Lisa. </i>For a few dozen examples, serious, humorous, witty, and vulgar, please go to <a href="https://www.google.ca/search?q=munch+scream&hl=en&tbo=u&tbm=isch&source=univ&sa=X&ei=gZkZUe_YK-iAiwKQuIDIAw&sqi=2&ved=0CDYQsAQ&biw=1920&bih=890">https://www.google.ca/search?q=munch+scream&hl=en&tbo=u&tbm=isch&source=univ&sa=X&ei=gZkZUe_YK-iAiwKQuIDIAw&sqi=2&ved=0CDYQsAQ&biw=1920&bih=890</a> . Munch himself revisited the theme several times, expressing the emotional pain that he experienced in his personal life, and by extension, the angst of his times. Obviously I need to apologize to Munch for yet another reworking of his famous image; now I will explain, and try to justify, my doing so.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdHj8_KoHwCwg64uPMy9_O6Z2ZWNQLfLNKtIEOv-dllIwpZz6C88xcjYYSpcJrjWszVBvCz9r96BiYtBUYBQlaZTc2-vGldcYQDogho3Yco-Hr8jYS-ABO5DkbOpwucKJzeakc9VDhglgb/s1600/Thomson's+Mutants+1+16x18+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdHj8_KoHwCwg64uPMy9_O6Z2ZWNQLfLNKtIEOv-dllIwpZz6C88xcjYYSpcJrjWszVBvCz9r96BiYtBUYBQlaZTc2-vGldcYQDogho3Yco-Hr8jYS-ABO5DkbOpwucKJzeakc9VDhglgb/s200/Thomson's+Mutants+1+16x18+2012.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZyE-uXAnTPB9rjN0gvJW-KPPqvNtb9MzL43dGUxiUmZrxMwYxOyxCcC47opPZEwwoQSAWsWMy6p1dAjBiq6vm44TcT0NAlsYYYHq7MBbgVTgcbhTGiFsWahszyJRYXi29ASs2NWEaKO3y/s1600/Blue+Moon+14x18+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="155" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZyE-uXAnTPB9rjN0gvJW-KPPqvNtb9MzL43dGUxiUmZrxMwYxOyxCcC47opPZEwwoQSAWsWMy6p1dAjBiq6vm44TcT0NAlsYYYHq7MBbgVTgcbhTGiFsWahszyJRYXi29ASs2NWEaKO3y/s200/Blue+Moon+14x18+2012.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In the early part of 2012 I made a series of paintings on the theme "Quotes from the Masters." The idea was to refer to famous works of art without copying them exactly, a requirement I fulfilled by reworking images first by Van Gogh and then by Tom Thomson but changing all the colours to their complementaries. I wrote about my "mutants" in this blog--please see my entries for March and November 2012. For me this was a new and challenging way to work, and to feel closer to the creators of the paintings on which I was focusing my attention.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Around this time, Ruth Payne, who runs the Ferry Building Gallery in West Vancouver, announced a themed exhibition to be mounted in 2013. The theme was "Hungry Ghosts: Living in the Age of Consumerism." The phrase "Hungry Ghosts" was evocative, but didn't mean much to me, and I dismissed the project from my mind. A bit later, however, I heard Ruth explain that the hungry ghosts, deriving from Zen Buddhism, are mythical beings that are perpetually hungry but can never be satisfied. [Much later I was to learn that the ghosts are unable to swallow because their necks are too thin; if I'd had that information sooner my painting would have turned out rather differently . . . ] The germ of an idea lodged in my imagination, and became gradually more compelling. Could I perhaps "quote" from Munch and turn his screaming figure into a hungry ghost? I bought a book with a good reproduction of one version of<i> The Scream </i>and decided to keep Munch's composition and colours much the same, while making my figure hugely obese and substantial instead of the original wispy waif. The painting evolved as I worked on it and reflected on the theme. My interpretation is a representation of an eating disorder, and by implication of addictions in general. Like the Zen ghosts, my overindulger is always hungry and never satisfied, regardless of how much she eats. The title that popped into my head one day as I was working refers to the bellyache that the person suffers from eating too much unsuitable food, and the psychic pain of addiction. Of course, it's also a play on Munch's title.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwyYKaB_LRP-Z-mnixGiLs1PCkSMFV1n40JBwBJCqiN1Th-acOCCvKCsmFjZRNz2NyD9Bi4VLUswJ_TWKNpa6xKp6OKvfluxkrycfoZDHl-UrZXV4gI1fEGE41HZXSdt6WMknO2l4vabLQ/s1600/The+Groan+24x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwyYKaB_LRP-Z-mnixGiLs1PCkSMFV1n40JBwBJCqiN1Th-acOCCvKCsmFjZRNz2NyD9Bi4VLUswJ_TWKNpa6xKp6OKvfluxkrycfoZDHl-UrZXV4gI1fEGE41HZXSdt6WMknO2l4vabLQ/s320/The+Groan+24x20+2012.jpg" width="264" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Groan - </i>acrylic - 24" x 20" - 2012</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">At first I kept the strong diagonal line of the fence rails or bridge parapet of Munch's painting, but as my figure increased in bulk she squeezed out the background. I had also wanted all along to include a reference to junk food. Timidly I introduced a cupcake or two . . . then more and more . . . until I had a whole incoming tide of cakes that threatened to surround the figure and overwhelm her. So the cakes come to represent the flood of unnecessary consumer stuff, edible and otherwise, that arouses our desires but fails to satisfy for long.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It will have become apparent that for me this had turned into a serious painting on a serious theme; but I have to acknowledge that it also belongs to the long line of jokes at the expense of <i>The Scream</i>. Some of the people who have looked at my painting have laughed--and then felt they had to apologize! A few said they found it disturbing. And a number responded by salivating over the cupcakes!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>The Groan </i>was accepted by the jury who adjudicated the submissions, and duly appeared in the "Hungry Ghosts" exhibition in January, along with an interesting and varied collection of two- and three-dimensional work. There is a satisfaction in responding to a challenge like this one: as with the best art school assignments, they nudge me in directions that would never otherwise have occurred to me.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-51912388802684975502012-11-13T22:50:00.000-08:002012-11-13T22:50:10.438-08:00Meet the Artists--in person and on canvas!<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In a few days' time, on the weekend of November 16 - 18, along with most of my studio mates, I will be taking part in this year's Eastside Culture Crawl. For me it will be the eighth time I have played hostess in my studio space, first at 901 Main St. and then, since 2010, at Portside Studios, 150 McLean Drive. For detailed information about the Crawl, and to download a map showing all the participating artists and studios, please see <span id="goog_613627314"><a href="http://www.eastsideculturecrawl.com/">www.eastsideculturecrawl.com</a></span></span><br />
<span id="goog_613627314"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">If you have never "crawled" before, be warned: this is a very big event with an awful lot to see!The list of artists in the printed brochure takes up four double-columned pages. We are spread over an area extending from Main St. to Victoria Drive and from East 1st Ave. to the Burrard Inlet waterfront. So although there are dedicated Crawlers who make a full time job of it from 5 pm on the Friday through to 6:00 on the Sunday (maybe they are the same people who see ten movies a day during the Film Festival) most people select a few studios, giving preference to artists they know personally or whose work they admire. Another warning--mid-November is not the best time of year for leisurely strolls through Vancouver's streets! Although we have occasionally had beautiful autumn days, my memory tells me it's more often been pouring, and once we had a blizzard. So a policy adopted by the initiated is to favour buildings like Portside Studios, where there are a number of artists to visit and where once you are inside you are good for at least half an hour and can dry off and warm up</span>.</span><br />
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<span id="goog_613627314"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In my last blog post (October 9, 2012) I wrote about the opportunities that have presented themselves this year to hang paintings on other people's walls. In the case of the Crawl, of course, I'm using my own walls, the ones I rent at Portside. Most of the work I'll be showing is from this year and includes the paintings I've completed so far on the theme "Artists at Work." I referred to two of them last time, but there are eight more. What attracted me to this subject is the intense absorption and concentration of all the artists, amateurs and professionals, who range in age from about twelve months to more than seven decades. As I wrote in "Facing Facts"--please see this blog, September 11, 2011--I like to see children engaged with their whole bodies and all their senses in an activity which, for the time being, is the most important thing in the world. Years ago, as an education student, I read a book by Maria Montessori. I remember almost nothing about it except that Montessori called this concentration "the great work of children," which adults should respect, even revere. I enjoy watching my grandchildren absorbed in their "great work", but I don't believe they have a monopoly on it. Certainly artists at work demonstrate the same attitudes.</span></span><br />
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<span id="goog_613627314"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The artists I've painted are people of whom I had taken or acquired photographs that I found interesting. They include friends, acquaintances and family members, and one or two whom I met on painting holidays. I will not give any of them a name, so it's fine if they don't recognize themselves!</span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1p1jH93BY_pmyG4MkwBUk6tSRH3_jc7E2eeXC4JAf4S_As8j1PAeDqVqfL-9ZGTxu4wIQaqNNzM6YRQ1FeH1_u3gRSWE-diWcpbzHpxPT1jIf5XuphzeJiWMeaSuvVasZDVAwiG0H080P/s1600/1+Artist+in+a+Field+of+Gold+16x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="254" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1p1jH93BY_pmyG4MkwBUk6tSRH3_jc7E2eeXC4JAf4S_As8j1PAeDqVqfL-9ZGTxu4wIQaqNNzM6YRQ1FeH1_u3gRSWE-diWcpbzHpxPT1jIf5XuphzeJiWMeaSuvVasZDVAwiG0H080P/s320/1+Artist+in+a+Field+of+Gold+16x20+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist in a Field of Gold</i> - acrylic - 2012 - 16" x 20"</td></tr>
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<span id="goog_613627314"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">First, two people painting outdoors in southwestern France. A group of us were there for a painting holiday arranged by the proprietors of Brambles, an art retreat in Devon, England. (For information about their courses and trips see <a href="http://www.bramblesartretreat.com/">www.bramblesartretreat.com</a> .) We were in a beautiful rural setting not far from Toulouse and the foothills of the Pyrenees.On a sunny but coolish September morning we strung ourselves out along the side of the road to paint the view across the fields, which included a fine Romanesque church. </span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6A2wQYJLERnJjnvoxGfalEhMTQaLA3qnlozLGImN_LQ1lyscX2psuU8xqS4RSWAyUch6awXUESB_E5xDOP10X4OkcQHnce2IHsxMwiWJPOsqkmII47pWKj6XGt-tV7s5RvXI5RMjlQ92g/s1600/4+Painter+in+a+Bean+Field+in+prog.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6A2wQYJLERnJjnvoxGfalEhMTQaLA3qnlozLGImN_LQ1lyscX2psuU8xqS4RSWAyUch6awXUESB_E5xDOP10X4OkcQHnce2IHsxMwiWJPOsqkmII47pWKj6XGt-tV7s5RvXI5RMjlQ92g/s320/4+Painter+in+a+Bean+Field+in+prog.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist in a Bean Field</i> - acrylic - 2012 - 16" x 20"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">When artists are busy it is as if they were in their own little world, as if other people didn't exist. The chair backs and the backdrop of trees seem to define these little worlds and separate the artists from the viewer.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaPxQ5E-shXOb-uyJ7-a6zwu1SLFgnFPm8iipsWAyMBLHSAB9lkHtCEZQcwGYxgg-Y3zXWEbWIgxQrEAiJtPa2FV5QrhGwjLMFlQ3pi7mimL8PU3MQeA5eez0jFRxlkMKZ2kWfsaqk0iBR/s1600/Bridge+on+the+Lydd+2010+11x14.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="156" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaPxQ5E-shXOb-uyJ7-a6zwu1SLFgnFPm8iipsWAyMBLHSAB9lkHtCEZQcwGYxgg-Y3zXWEbWIgxQrEAiJtPa2FV5QrhGwjLMFlQ3pi7mimL8PU3MQeA5eez0jFRxlkMKZ2kWfsaqk0iBR/s200/Bridge+on+the+Lydd+2010+11x14.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bridge on the Lydd</i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVQkChcHB9vMIJW7wR6hhmW4j6oVhKnUelHxwCuPeJe4oJLOe7N0AmxjuZKVH_451mrlWr3iaSZgNa1-cPD3Jz7fzS3Qs4BmoL55D7c593JECPH92g5z8FMgs-eL3iltuaP__7AVi_b1BR/s1600/The+Red+Tractor+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="138" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVQkChcHB9vMIJW7wR6hhmW4j6oVhKnUelHxwCuPeJe4oJLOe7N0AmxjuZKVH_451mrlWr3iaSZgNa1-cPD3Jz7fzS3Qs4BmoL55D7c593JECPH92g5z8FMgs-eL3iltuaP__7AVi_b1BR/s200/The+Red+Tractor+2010.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Red Tractor</i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The next artist was also a Brambles student, but this time at the retreat in Devon, in June. We had a week of glorious weather and were able to work outside every day. In this picture we were in the yard at Brambles, but we also worked in a farmyard, where I painted "The Red Tractor," and in a partly dried up river bed, which I wrote about in my post of September 13, 2011.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRn3FOGrpMTlohti3bbt2RsrZkDS97Ji6ioNi-wRujqPKNwsw0gX7oMTwliFluKCcLsHNhLwEv5vsvaIFHfAmsVLd_cyh4jbDeq0wQ0uFBqvg5InEq5BN7Gdbu4PWZeqGKpdhu19On6VkK/s1600/3+Artist+on+an+Iron+Bench+16x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRn3FOGrpMTlohti3bbt2RsrZkDS97Ji6ioNi-wRujqPKNwsw0gX7oMTwliFluKCcLsHNhLwEv5vsvaIFHfAmsVLd_cyh4jbDeq0wQ0uFBqvg5InEq5BN7Gdbu4PWZeqGKpdhu19On6VkK/s320/3+Artist+on+an+Iron+Bench+16x20+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist on an Iron Bench - </i>acrylic - 2012 - 16" x 20"</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"Artist on an Iron Bench" is perhaps my favourite so far. I like the minimal background and the pinkish colour, which suggests the wall of the old cottage.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Next we go to Vancouver Island and a chilly spring morning. You have to be dedicated to sketch outdoors in anything but perfect weather, but this artist and I dressed warmly and stuck it out for a couple of hours.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxANqNu5s6KF3H4L4aR8E5CSmFkNQopSO0oGESIVi0H2PayYeNHhC0j21-hjHbBO97ArxhNoplYbqRPuHZ2gelbXlrv-hyxjvizyXt4HFveJawpEhQlFf5QDYbPto3q8NsARGSMXKR32IB/s1600/2+Sketcher+in+a+Forest+16x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxANqNu5s6KF3H4L4aR8E5CSmFkNQopSO0oGESIVi0H2PayYeNHhC0j21-hjHbBO97ArxhNoplYbqRPuHZ2gelbXlrv-hyxjvizyXt4HFveJawpEhQlFf5QDYbPto3q8NsARGSMXKR32IB/s320/2+Sketcher+in+a+Forest+16x20+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist in a Forest</i> - acrylic - 2012 - 16" x 20" <i></i></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The next three artists are members of Vancouver Sketch Club, and as I mentioned last time, were my contribution to the Sketch Club's 60th anniversary exhibition. We were drawing from the model in the Coach House at Hycroft, the headquarters of the University Women's Club of Vancouver. In the case of "Artist in a Black and White Outfit", it was the coordinated outfit itself which appealed to me, whereas in "Artist in a Red Scarf" I particularly liked the network of easels in the background. "Artist in Shirt Sleeves" was a challenge since I changed the background several times, moving the open door, eliminating it completely, and finally reinstating it, since the composition seemed to need something there.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9yjgp_KuRquOb_3bXLV5TCd6LtoYTDOZNoDc8pTvudewweKGazrPzUI3aO1ZHuuUgK11Ykb2aR2PyObT5k-cyFVBuoxT9lGsJ4JxgdI3TM45ZZjOeHXSBmkfcZXDYSu-_yXxwY6UbLirX/s1600/6+Artist+in+Shirt+Sleeves+16x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="257" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9yjgp_KuRquOb_3bXLV5TCd6LtoYTDOZNoDc8pTvudewweKGazrPzUI3aO1ZHuuUgK11Ykb2aR2PyObT5k-cyFVBuoxT9lGsJ4JxgdI3TM45ZZjOeHXSBmkfcZXDYSu-_yXxwY6UbLirX/s320/6+Artist+in+Shirt+Sleeves+16x20+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist in Shirt Sleeves</i> - acrylic - 2012 - 16" x 20" </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgimvT7ShVVDGH2Jj2zf9gXsHHSYBVHAM68SMWDQJhzHm4jJHgRh3NNloP4-KdznAXkNiiLnHb3YvsfGbf027AUsXZIoSqpSUi80M1rF6gtYl5zthEh0-obFGxTMTpqz3kCzSeH8cp_Pc4F/s1600/5+Artist+in+a+Black+and+White+Outfit+20x16+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgimvT7ShVVDGH2Jj2zf9gXsHHSYBVHAM68SMWDQJhzHm4jJHgRh3NNloP4-KdznAXkNiiLnHb3YvsfGbf027AUsXZIoSqpSUi80M1rF6gtYl5zthEh0-obFGxTMTpqz3kCzSeH8cp_Pc4F/s320/5+Artist+in+a+Black+and+White+Outfit+20x16+2012.jpg" width="255" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist in a Black & White Outfit</i> - acrylic - 2012 - 20" x 16"</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgH2lS43t1C31tFlwBhkNDVQt7-GR0TEZe6N6T9TevUBfjgi5yYM48wF95kQyShYnC31x7G1MS4dj8rnz0rKCe_BLntlKtkghqRfrNUMl4UfhyphenhyphenIFBYV-AmIIC9GJxwXTGRDzZi3YOPxa3i/s1600/7+Artist+with+a+Red+Scarf+16x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgH2lS43t1C31tFlwBhkNDVQt7-GR0TEZe6N6T9TevUBfjgi5yYM48wF95kQyShYnC31x7G1MS4dj8rnz0rKCe_BLntlKtkghqRfrNUMl4UfhyphenhyphenIFBYV-AmIIC9GJxwXTGRDzZi3YOPxa3i/s320/7+Artist+with+a+Red+Scarf+16x20+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist in a Red Scarf</i> - acrylic - 2012 - 16" x 20"</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6j1eyiNcjDriBmyS4MRQgKd3zvkXLaQoVDYl9d-MbRHJAbtLgzw8BcnxISPHlp66J3JuODv9bE9QJu-QdBygpZkKCjSHTsrx0P7jX_ES7475xYcRQLxw-kA2DQn1hBgcMgok0MMFpadQe/s1600/Shore+Line.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="134" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6j1eyiNcjDriBmyS4MRQgKd3zvkXLaQoVDYl9d-MbRHJAbtLgzw8BcnxISPHlp66J3JuODv9bE9QJu-QdBygpZkKCjSHTsrx0P7jX_ES7475xYcRQLxw-kA2DQn1hBgcMgok0MMFpadQe/s200/Shore+Line.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Shore Line</i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9od3c015VXAQP_pe3fIg3c4t4eH9EzBjfyLbaQl5gm8ULuana8PN6TBSsH3DdAw5XnhnVhtr9VFWwGp5RxkY48sYucTotOztaiT6k17sb4lLKLrATo-PcuQNp0UzM5BjVKKN2Pogzq1XW/s1600/9+Artist+beside+a+Pond+16x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9od3c015VXAQP_pe3fIg3c4t4eH9EzBjfyLbaQl5gm8ULuana8PN6TBSsH3DdAw5XnhnVhtr9VFWwGp5RxkY48sYucTotOztaiT6k17sb4lLKLrATo-PcuQNp0UzM5BjVKKN2Pogzq1XW/s320/9+Artist+beside+a+Pond+16x20+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><i>Artist beside a Pond</i> -</span> acrylic - 2012 - 16" x 20"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I wrote about summer sketching in"The Great Outdoors", August 7, 2012. One of our regular venues is Jericho Beach Park, where there is a variety of subject matter to choose from. Several years ago I spotted the row of elderly ladies that became the painting "Shore Line." This year I photographed the woman who features in "Artist beside a Pond." I particularly liked the way the trees and plants framed her, enhancing the "own little world" effect.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjg4S0zZ0MSlB3_DSjfyzKi807zk2EOCIv10rgohhG2EnWNlkkpsNeoKdZrjtgCu37-BZhsJ6PQoCEwx8EYcIas1e_DCnPtXuV3YflhpxarNQNrr3GowZQqki8rP_SynbdBPO_MZuEtn9d/s1600/8+Artist+in+a+Red+Chair+20x16+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjg4S0zZ0MSlB3_DSjfyzKi807zk2EOCIv10rgohhG2EnWNlkkpsNeoKdZrjtgCu37-BZhsJ6PQoCEwx8EYcIas1e_DCnPtXuV3YflhpxarNQNrr3GowZQqki8rP_SynbdBPO_MZuEtn9d/s320/8+Artist+in+a+Red+Chair+20x16+2012.jpg" width="251" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist in a Red Chair - </i>acrylic - 2012 - 20" x 16"</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEsWeHJYQzUIK-PxTBOqp3YSyjGYzEMcqMzjc-vkL7l7BdV553FNTn2DiGSL4o5wD9sU8CB2lKG4Utm2epfN-CA4a78lyYAqNlywqjj3STPfXTy-34U6agbKQuZRFUIWuWUoEygyQ-bf1G/s1600/Artist+with+a+Green+Crayon+16x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="253" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEsWeHJYQzUIK-PxTBOqp3YSyjGYzEMcqMzjc-vkL7l7BdV553FNTn2DiGSL4o5wD9sU8CB2lKG4Utm2epfN-CA4a78lyYAqNlywqjj3STPfXTy-34U6agbKQuZRFUIWuWUoEygyQ-bf1G/s320/Artist+with+a+Green+Crayon+16x20+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist with a Green Crayon - </i>acrylic - 2012 - 16" x 20"<i><br /></i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Finally, the two youngest of my artists. On one of our summer sketching days a member brought along her grandchildren, whom she was baby-sitting for the day. I loved the way the little girl in "Artist in a Red Chair" had curled herself up as she drew the trees edging the park. Maria Montessori would have been happy to see her, as she would with the baby boy in "Artist with a Green Crayon." Scarcely big enough to see over the table, and with his left thumb an essential part of the creative process, this tiny artist is just as absorbed in his Great Work as any of the other people in my series.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Do come and see the paintings if you are in the Vancouver area, and contact me if you have a photo of your own Artist at Work that you might like to see as a 16" x 20" painting. One condition--no mugging for the camera--your artist must be oblivious to everything except the task in hand! you can send me a message via this sight, or through my website, <a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Next blog post? Probably not before January.</i></span></div>
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<span id="goog_613627314"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span> </span>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-29611340763879754942012-09-20T20:20:00.000-07:002012-10-30T20:20:15.389-07:00Let it Show! --My Work on Other People's Walls<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There are artists who are content to paint in private year after year, squirrelling the fruits of their labours away in their attics and basements. I'm not one of those. For one thing I don't have a basement, or any other place big enough to accommodate what is by now a considerable inventory. And I am fairly prolific: I am now working on my 17th painting of 2012, to give you an idea. So for that reason alone it's a relief to be able to get some of it out of my house and on to other people's walls, even if it all comes back again days, weeks or months later</span>.<br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There's another purely practical reason. Since 2005, when I obtained my BFA degree and rented a studio space for the first time, I have been conducting my art practice as a "small business." This means that I can deduct my art-related expenses, the greatest of which is my studio rent. The big advantage is that, since at the moment my art business runs at a loss, it reduces my overall income, and therefore my income tax bill. Before I set this up I attended a lecture on the topic, at which an accountant explained the rules, since of course the Canadian government is not enthusiastic about receiving less tax. In general a "small business" must demonstrate that it has "reasonable expectation of profit." However, even the government realizes that for artists "REOP" is a long shot, so it has a second criterion: "<i>active pursuit of profit." </i> So for me, making an effort to get my work out into places where it will be seen by a wider audience than my family and my studio mates, and where it may possibly attract buyers, is an outward and visible sign of pursuing profit.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Even without these practical considerations it would be important to me to display my paintings. I have a real feeling of achievement in seeing my work displayed in public, especially if I can hang a whole series of related paintings in the same space. Viewers' reactions and comments are fascinating and instructive too. I know that enough people respond positively to my work to make it worth putting it out there for their enjoyment. Canvases stacked in closets or against the wall are not doing anyone much good.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">So . . . for all these reasons I submit my work to juries and take part in events and group activities. And this year a whole host of opportunities have presented themselves more or less together, between now and the end of the year. So if you live in the Vancouver area and would like to see examples of my actual work, as opposed to virtual thumbnails, please come to some of the following venues or events. I have already written in this blog about some of the work, and don't want to repeat myself unduly, so I'll just give the reference to the relevant blog instalment. If you want to take a(nother) look at it, just click on the relevant date on the list to the upper right of your screen, where it says "Blog Archive."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">First up is a group show with Vancouver Sketch Club, <a href="http://www.myartclub.com/the.vancouver.sketch.club">www.myartclub.com/the.vancouver.sketch.club</a> , which is due to open Saturday September 29 in the upstairs lounge of the Metro Theatre, along with the Theatre's next production, <i>I'll be Back Before Midnight</i>, described as "a chilling evening down on the farm"! You can only get in to see the art show if you attend the play, but do come for an inexpensive evening out,Thurs. through Sat. evenings and Sunday matinees until October 27. See <a href="http://www.metrotheatre.com/">www.metrotheatre.com</a> for more information. The theme for our art show is "Quotes from the Masters." I wrote about this project, and the three paintings I planned to submit to the show, in "Getting Going Again: Vincent's Mutants" -- please see this blog, March 2012. However, I sold the paintings shortly afterwards, and painted two different ones for the show. I followed the same procedure--changing the colours of the original to their complementaries--but the "master" I quoted from was Tom Thomson, and the paintings two of his best known, "The West Wind " and "The Jack Pine." You can see the original versions at </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_West_Wind_%28painting%29">en.wikip</a></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_West_Wind_%28painting%29">edia.org/wiki/The_West_Wind_(painting)</a></span> <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">and</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.gallery.ca/en/see/collections/artwork.php?mkey=11056">www.gallery.ca/en/see/collections/artwork.php?mkey=11056</a> and compare them with my much smaller mutants, each 16" x 18".</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQCTJl5UEMZjzcO6eSDrNzF9Z_hydnU3K3cuhimgOOc8TkGxFuVxToSanSn1SaSKWFTaXL7QHqAcrMS9tTVLrDIy80xF7NifvHV2tplNozl9DaMTe9ZXlIFpZS_Rkjn4SWSh_MkolOQrJb/s1600/Thomson's+Mutants+1+16x18+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQCTJl5UEMZjzcO6eSDrNzF9Z_hydnU3K3cuhimgOOc8TkGxFuVxToSanSn1SaSKWFTaXL7QHqAcrMS9tTVLrDIy80xF7NifvHV2tplNozl9DaMTe9ZXlIFpZS_Rkjn4SWSh_MkolOQrJb/s200/Thomson's+Mutants+1+16x18+2012.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwsD21Ll_fyqZG55cCeem-rJzdBs_7yLx11stHx8Lq6zt01n8Ya9F2np1kjsSnq37c7O_KtbCOihNXpTY0_n5wuSPYVITAJ4KtFkSc3kFZBtU_7_zmPKEQn0usaiohp_HAEc0bor-qHhzK/s1600/Thomson's+Mutants+2+16x18+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="178" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwsD21Ll_fyqZG55cCeem-rJzdBs_7yLx11stHx8Lq6zt01n8Ya9F2np1kjsSnq37c7O_KtbCOihNXpTY0_n5wuSPYVITAJ4KtFkSc3kFZBtU_7_zmPKEQn0usaiohp_HAEc0bor-qHhzK/s200/Thomson's+Mutants+2+16x18+2012.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Oddly, I found these much harder to paint than the Van Gogh mutants! Less surprisingly, I learned that changing the colours greatly alters the <b>mood </b>of a landscape.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQgdPeyNHkFAVIete9uLroWq9j5MD202Zf9fwZJ96xbj12VwmZ08SMHpyuuRXpX6pIIhfBK_jvsyl25ddEhoYYPFNku4oH74rKszavqrLGa9dPxHMydUji_TFxsNT7TtwRIj6OjiAfKbZF/s1600/Watery+World+4+2011+30x24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQgdPeyNHkFAVIete9uLroWq9j5MD202Zf9fwZJ96xbj12VwmZ08SMHpyuuRXpX6pIIhfBK_jvsyl25ddEhoYYPFNku4oH74rKszavqrLGa9dPxHMydUji_TFxsNT7TtwRIj6OjiAfKbZF/s320/Watery+World+4+2011+30x24.jpg" width="250" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The weekend of Sept. 28 - 30 I will be taking part in an art event called the Main Drift, open to artists who live or work on or near Main Street. I am planning to be in a display space at 350 East 2nd Ave. (the same venue as I was in for the last Drift, in 2010) from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">on the Saturday and Sunday, with fellow painters Vanessa Lam and Melanie Ellery. For much more information and a map, please see <a href="http://www.thedrift.ca/">www.thedrift.ca</a> . I will be showing some of my "Watery World" series, which I wrote about in "Reflecting on Reflections," April 2012. Here's "Watery World 4" as an example.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The following week the Vancouver Sketch Club will be hanging another show, this time to celebrate its 60th anniversary. The Club has gone through some drastic changes over the years. It started as an all-male preserve for downtown businessmen who wanted to sketch or paint in the Vancouver Art Gallery. For many years women--the wives of the members--were relegated to the role of refreshment providers and cleaner-uppers at meetings. Eventually some of the wives--supported by a few husbands--rebelled, and were grudgingly admitted to the Club, which now has a predominantly female membership! Our celebratory show will be installed at the West End Community Centre on Denman St. and will run from October1 to 20. There is no specific theme for this show. I am planning to include two or three of the series that has been my main focus this year, paintings of artists at work. What I like about the subject </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">is the artists' complete absorption in their activity; they seem to be each in their own separate world. I have so far completed eight paintings, and want to do five or six more--by which time I'll be ready for a complete change of direction! Here's "Artist in a Black and White Outfit" as an example.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVGcpsTU8fgzkRPYBEKLJWIvX5EnP1Pp02nlcqYE76vkN8ICXYk-1Vp99xF3EZz4kyKygIZ10RXJrM0edHyRlWjgzMODSHNiGhUL4JarQmkIhFhXT1QINHjvRbgvcmBpN_ZCk2zNPEXJeo/s1600/5+Artist+in+a+Black+and+White+Outfit+20x16+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVGcpsTU8fgzkRPYBEKLJWIvX5EnP1Pp02nlcqYE76vkN8ICXYk-1Vp99xF3EZz4kyKygIZ10RXJrM0edHyRlWjgzMODSHNiGhUL4JarQmkIhFhXT1QINHjvRbgvcmBpN_ZCk2zNPEXJeo/s320/5+Artist+in+a+Black+and+White+Outfit+20x16+2012.jpg" width="255" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist in a Black and White Outfit</i> - 2012 - 20" x 16"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In the same week I'll be hauling off a carload of paintings to a Massage Clinic, <a href="http://www.cambievillagemassagetherapy.ca/">www.cambievillagemassagetherapy.ca</a> , where, as a member of the Drift Society, I have been invited to display work for three months--my longest stay to date on Other People's Walls! As with the Metro Theatre, you can only see the work if you patronize the establishment, so if you have sore muscles, here's your chance to combine a massage with art appreciation. I will be sharing the wall space with Melanie Ellery, and am planning to show work which features people. This is work from longer ago, and I have written about most of it before--please see 2011 instalments, especially Feb. 20, March 6, May, June, September and December. For example, I'll be including "Country Church".</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioCypaYvHGfmbsGB7saeXgGoyMaV9LndfOTU6aBlW2jabOsMDY2Eqf-_IuwZ6dBa66BmUAphqsuRAnguXKDtMNOa9HONuz6pJoRDALX61OG3xBndmv-Sj6H60VyHMiwLKJleoy_FWmSBIO/s1600/Country+Church--Diptych.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="191" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioCypaYvHGfmbsGB7saeXgGoyMaV9LndfOTU6aBlW2jabOsMDY2Eqf-_IuwZ6dBa66BmUAphqsuRAnguXKDtMNOa9HONuz6pJoRDALX61OG3xBndmv-Sj6H60VyHMiwLKJleoy_FWmSBIO/s320/Country+Church--Diptych.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Country Church - </i>2009 - each panel 14" x 11"<i><br /></i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">November brings our big annual event, the Eastside Culture Crawl, <a href="http://www.eastsideculturecrawl.com/" rel="nofollow">www.eastsideculturecrawl.com</a> ,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">when our studio, Portside Studios at 150 McLean Drive, will open our doors for three days. I can't claim that the Crawl will get my work on to Other People's Walls, but I will at least have the opportunity to show it to Other People, and talk to them about it. Maybe even sell some of it . . . or, since I'll be showing my "Artists at Work" series, maybe I'll even secure commissions for further studies of artists! Well, I can fantasize! Here's another Artist at Work:</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz_alD6TxXgI6Gy5mPkAss_EnS_8nq8kr1rMQ6IHfBn7ZL-p-t2mUqKdXhO-qvlAki72X7F1UjqUElyYtwYiNf2q_J3yHtUfBzFZHa5xEqWqLWCYcDrSMd_EWSRSpyR8yAlh7yvZPHQR3e/s1600/3+Painter+on+an+Iron+Bench+16x20+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiz_alD6TxXgI6Gy5mPkAss_EnS_8nq8kr1rMQ6IHfBn7ZL-p-t2mUqKdXhO-qvlAki72X7F1UjqUElyYtwYiNf2q_J3yHtUfBzFZHa5xEqWqLWCYcDrSMd_EWSRSpyR8yAlh7yvZPHQR3e/s320/3+Painter+on+an+Iron+Bench+16x20+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Artist on an Iron Bench </i>- 2012 - 16" x 20"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">And that brings us to December, when I'll be showing a selection of paintings from my series "In Praise of November" at the Hycroft Gallery in the home of the University Women's Club of Vancouver, <a href="http://www.uwcvancouver.ca/">www.uwcvancouver.ca</a> .</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I wrote about this series in my posts of March 13 and November 2011, and in March 2012. I don't yet know the exact dates of this show, and I'm still deciding which paintings to include, but they will be mostly landscapes and trees. Here's one:</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQWJ_AL1F3RkT-PEfV0kkjVIgs6ETQQgsUrRH4NnkqraupxQCB1rxF5In_v92IKBEsWeJyGwKS6XqA9pLQO1LHNrImDhm88kUyalqJ5NJLlmEzdV0sSvaUhY1mzOJEXoubKbfL80vKIPNs/s1600/3+November+Snow+20x20+2009.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQWJ_AL1F3RkT-PEfV0kkjVIgs6ETQQgsUrRH4NnkqraupxQCB1rxF5In_v92IKBEsWeJyGwKS6XqA9pLQO1LHNrImDhm88kUyalqJ5NJLlmEzdV0sSvaUhY1mzOJEXoubKbfL80vKIPNs/s320/3+November+Snow+20x20+2009.jpg" width="316" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>November Snow</i> - 2009 - 20" x 20"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There! A major move in the direction of Mother Hubbard walls, and ample proof for the tax man, if he happens to be paying attention, of my "active pursuit of profit." My showing streak even extends into January--but that's another story!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Next blog post in a month or so. Thanks for reading!</i></span></div>
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Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-18147534843654171162012-08-07T13:02:00.000-07:002012-08-07T13:05:47.271-07:00The Great Outdoors: A Sketch is Just a Sketch<br />
<i><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This post is decorated with pages from my sketch books. As I explain below, I make no claims for these simple efforts: they are just . . . sketches.</span></i><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hostas</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Most of my paintings, even my landscapes, are produced in the studio and based on photographs that I have taken earlier and edited on the computer.<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Some artists, of course, paint outdoors, making a virtue of the constantly changing effects of light and weather. The Impressionists are famous for this approach, with Monet's multiple paintings of the same cathedral or group of haystacks being prime examples. (Please see <a href="http://www.learn.columbia.edu/monet/swf">www.learn.columbia.edu/monet/swf</a> and <a href="http://www.artsology.com/monetlight.php">www.artsology.com/monetlight.php</a> .)</span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjav8aRofD9qQ5KVUkfdYTau2obnXZg261fTJlVtfeG-GVT53ywkn_e3JvLMOnjW_zKlAXKE-dVAwR9ayu2ii1sbg6BkRUSgM7Ecv9CzKiltLUgCj8Oww-Y4n1SQ4pmOPyoRfe1dxBwGvxP/s1600/Hydrangea.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjav8aRofD9qQ5KVUkfdYTau2obnXZg261fTJlVtfeG-GVT53ywkn_e3JvLMOnjW_zKlAXKE-dVAwR9ayu2ii1sbg6BkRUSgM7Ecv9CzKiltLUgCj8Oww-Y4n1SQ4pmOPyoRfe1dxBwGvxP/s200/Hydrangea.jpg" width="186" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hydrangea</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Other artists make quick, small paintings on site with a view to elaborating them later into more ambitious compositions. These fresh air enthusiasts may disapprove of painting from photos, and can produce some persuasive arguments to support their opinion. They may say that the struggle to express the reality that confronts their eyes, the challenge of limiting, framing, and editing all that messy detail out there and reducing three dimensions to two, not to mention dealing with changing light and atmospheric effects, makes for an enriched and more lively painting</span></span>.<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> The freshness and spontaneity of a modest work produced on site can be very appealing, sometimes more so than the large, studio-painted canvas based upon it. See, for example, <a href="http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Jack_Pine">www.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Jack_Pine</a> , where different versions of Tom Thomson's iconic painting are compared. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1qvFCVUFWh0uHcLlTGxvHUV0lLLRiMZQimZ7N815_VWOqvzKSXKFw2cCGhmg6m4AA6cO3kih-MDenYfOvunLOV59jqi5HKHQrJahvlVJ3827SJ4aU_bsahr3d28lX0ro2GX9FTyI2vnZt/s1600/Tugs+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1qvFCVUFWh0uHcLlTGxvHUV0lLLRiMZQimZ7N815_VWOqvzKSXKFw2cCGhmg6m4AA6cO3kih-MDenYfOvunLOV59jqi5HKHQrJahvlVJ3827SJ4aU_bsahr3d28lX0ro2GX9FTyI2vnZt/s320/Tugs+2010.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tugs on the Fraser</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For myself, however, working only on location would produce very few paintings. For one thing, there's the weather, especially here in the rain forest. You have to be very dedicated to shiver in the drizzle while your paper blows away or your painting goes blotchy. But also there's the lack of privacy. If you work outdoors, unless you take yourself off to the seclusion of the mountains, where you'll be bothered only by bears, </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">you're subjected to a constant stream of passers-by who are desperate to breathe down your neck and ask what you're doing.<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span>Many artists don't mind this at all, and regard the interruptions as opportunities for educating the public and even drumming up sales; but for me the intrusions are annoying, and being "on stage" can revive the panic I felt as a teenager when I had to play the piano for school assembly. I would never have made a performance artist!</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlOae_i2OU-ncEstBoc1cHT_MZVRFMcnJ_Dpn6_iIUHAGFH04Rwy0dsYNZiHAWYvczQNrkn0wvLlF4Su6CTjCthRs1JNh3VQ_OftVqsNoAkCiUb_47YJgOczruIcujzgfF5lFrFQ45gThj/s1600/Sketches+2007_0001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlOae_i2OU-ncEstBoc1cHT_MZVRFMcnJ_Dpn6_iIUHAGFH04Rwy0dsYNZiHAWYvczQNrkn0wvLlF4Su6CTjCthRs1JNh3VQ_OftVqsNoAkCiUb_47YJgOczruIcujzgfF5lFrFQ45gThj/s200/Sketches+2007_0001.jpg" width="190" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: x-small;">Moored in West Van</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Despite all this, I can thoroughly enjoy drawing and painting outdoors if I'm part of a class or informal group. There are few more pleasant ways to spend a warm summer day. Safety in numbers means that if I turn my back pointedly enough on the curious strollers they can fasten on a more promising victim. Now that summer has finally come to Vancouver (well, sort of . . . </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> with all this climate change we can't any longer count on the four to six weeks of solid warm sunny weather that used to define our July and August) I'm once again sketching each Wednesday with members and friends of the Vancouver Sketch Club.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOHIeAdYOZHtf_9mfZStE9_IH9zahSkzBDP2zYErc9yXzB97ord_7szzc5SFwNajyKhK_5CK1-OVEi64lYzn_j0RScqhcbPA-jZesfPMrZ93JhxlDu0LDvGu_cBGAc3tFg4orpLzB0kyla/s1600/Willow+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOHIeAdYOZHtf_9mfZStE9_IH9zahSkzBDP2zYErc9yXzB97ord_7szzc5SFwNajyKhK_5CK1-OVEi64lYzn_j0RScqhcbPA-jZesfPMrZ93JhxlDu0LDvGu_cBGAc3tFg4orpLzB0kyla/s320/Willow+2010.jpg" width="241" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Willow</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Our arrangements couldn't be simpler: two of us arrange to meet at a chosen spot, usually a park with a variety of subject material, shade, easy parking and public toilets. We send an email to our list of contacts announcing the place and time, and people either show up or don't. We've had as few as two and as many as thirteen. Some draw, some use watercolours. Some have had lots of experience, some are beginners</span>. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">We work for a few hours, chat a bit, eat a picnic lunch, and settle on the venue for the following week. If you would like to give it a try, please contact us at </span><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/the.vancouver.sketch.club" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.myartclub.com/the.vancouver.sketch.club</a>.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTuJFpWo-MlntqdQoQobUQ_Yf-n7U_VINUshfmpwHobPpFdRtQu4p058z5NtpjtpBmZAaTv87A2hbAzdgTa41FDiaWXeIw72RvsQAajgiKzngqRgPEZ_cutSea-5Om2edNECe1-0C0RdpF/s1600/Trout+Lake+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTuJFpWo-MlntqdQoQobUQ_Yf-n7U_VINUshfmpwHobPpFdRtQu4p058z5NtpjtpBmZAaTv87A2hbAzdgTa41FDiaWXeIw72RvsQAajgiKzngqRgPEZ_cutSea-5Om2edNECe1-0C0RdpF/s320/Trout+Lake+2012.jpg" width="286" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Trees in Trout Lake - 2012</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">As well as a pleasure, sketching is always a challenge and a learning experience, a return to the most basic form of art activity and the eye-brain-hand coordination that it requires.</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">At the same time it isn't--or shouldn't be--a <b>stressful</b> activity, because there is no requirement or expectation that it should produce a masterpiece. A sketch is just a sketch, no more and no less, and it makes no more sense to say a sketch is "good" or "bad" than to apply those adjectives to an entry in a personal journal. A sketch is a visual note or record, a quick experiment, and sometimes the first step in a project. For me, if a sketch catches some of the essence of what I'm looking at, it's successful.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDLO8YPRdPKb7OM1sR45e27-q0S-vunGdCtoqbgpDRO9woX8m8EgzBwG0LEQMTzv_jrGwlN-UqHasESuOY-VeOq_-V5r3nt7Dk81Vj_V1PTn55lPJ77q13FU6K1tnA2g538a83PDhBUZyn/s1600/Sketches+2007_0006.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDLO8YPRdPKb7OM1sR45e27-q0S-vunGdCtoqbgpDRO9woX8m8EgzBwG0LEQMTzv_jrGwlN-UqHasESuOY-VeOq_-V5r3nt7Dk81Vj_V1PTn55lPJ77q13FU6K1tnA2g538a83PDhBUZyn/s320/Sketches+2007_0006.jpg" width="304" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Garden Steps</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Unless I'm enrolled in a class, I prefer to be unambitious when sketching outdoors. I work small, often using a 6" x 6" sketch book and either pencil or black pen. I'm fascinated by the expressive possibilities of this simple equipment, but still have a lot to learn when it comes to conveying light and dark contrast by shading. The biggest challenge, and one I've been struggling with for years now, is how to capture the variety of leaf and branch shapes that my eyes distinguish. Often there is very little tonal difference between clumps of trees or shrubs, so the contrast has to come from the juxtaposition of <b>patterns. </b>I don't want to get too fussy and outline every leaf, though, so the question is how to create an impression with a minimum of pen strokes. In <i>Trees in Trout Lake </i>(above) I felt that I had come closer than usual to achieving this goal. Maybe this week I'll get there . . . but maybe not. After all, sketching is just sketching.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Next blog post? Well, theoretically in about a month, but my track record this year is not very good.</i> </span></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-65055091603636417852012-06-15T20:19:00.000-07:002012-07-27T20:09:19.717-07:00Bucolic Setting, Violent Confrontation<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">A year ago, in June 2011, during a three-week stay in England, I spent a couple of days in a small northern town called Kirkby Lonsdale. The main reason for my going there was to visit an old friend whom I hadn't seen since 2005, but I also hoped to have the opportunity to revisit a place that had so much impressed me on my previous visit that I had based three paintings on it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Kirkby Lonsdale, often shortened to Kirkby (with the second k silent) is a picturesque spot that I can heartily recommend for a visit. It's located between the Lake District and the Yorkshire Dales, and if you travel by train, as I did, the nearest station is Lancaster. A car would get you there more efficiently, but you might want to abandon it on arrival, since the streets are narrow and twisting, and slope steeply down to the River Lune.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkpX8zyhdlrQYMQi2PHYW3EcZvBN_MsMiVh7_N3QRRD_IkkP9ZmUlnPMJMzzcrG_dfqeF9ghrGhCUfhyphenhyphenZ9Iu-8ns2-hQBEJleRL6jn4xrHZj6-0K8V3C7WyNIcpfnRlPZLACqlqVKQLUYa/s1600/Kirkby+street.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkpX8zyhdlrQYMQi2PHYW3EcZvBN_MsMiVh7_N3QRRD_IkkP9ZmUlnPMJMzzcrG_dfqeF9ghrGhCUfhyphenhyphenZ9Iu-8ns2-hQBEJleRL6jn4xrHZj6-0K8V3C7WyNIcpfnRlPZLACqlqVKQLUYa/s200/Kirkby+street.JPG" width="150" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Kirkby street</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">One of Kirkby's attractions is a lookout point near the parish church from which you can gaze across the river and its valley at "Ruskin's View", named for the 19th century art critic and social reformer. I'm not sure if Ruskin actually painted the view or just stopped and looked at it, and I don't know exactly which way he was looking, either, but these photos will give you an idea of what he saw, and why he apparently found it so inspiring. It's English countryside at its best, and fortunately doesn't appear to have changed much since Ruskin's time.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0m3pAn7fwskAv8-ufVDfzk6ITQwyGbKBMuWXDiljBRrcooiYc-q4yGdgC8eEj-3bUT3odcwIcWK9BdmSKFCBSrbRufYLcyPpym3YIMIkaSK06BQ0Rck-jVFMTIM694tuXv4_p5-CiD6VT/s1600/Kirkby+Lonsdale+Ruskin%27s+View+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0m3pAn7fwskAv8-ufVDfzk6ITQwyGbKBMuWXDiljBRrcooiYc-q4yGdgC8eEj-3bUT3odcwIcWK9BdmSKFCBSrbRufYLcyPpym3YIMIkaSK06BQ0Rck-jVFMTIM694tuXv4_p5-CiD6VT/s200/Kirkby+Lonsdale+Ruskin%27s+View+1.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Ruskin's View 2</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2_UrXBBLXg2z6VRz_5veeRqUk4e4XnVScJgKQ4Go6n_B94saoM76kBqgCqmk8nGYro60Z61FpkSKN-S4syW_kShlxoWxTFzCXOhxBdWZmefuyHs0l74iueNFCYwIVB6k8HLEW7qjugNSC/s1600/Kirkby+Lonsdale+Ruskin%27s+View+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2_UrXBBLXg2z6VRz_5veeRqUk4e4XnVScJgKQ4Go6n_B94saoM76kBqgCqmk8nGYro60Z61FpkSKN-S4syW_kShlxoWxTFzCXOhxBdWZmefuyHs0l74iueNFCYwIVB6k8HLEW7qjugNSC/s200/Kirkby+Lonsdale+Ruskin%27s+View+2.jpg" style="cursor: move;" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Ruskin's View<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> 1</span></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Like my illustrious predecessor I too paused and and admired</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">this idyllic scene, but it was not the place I was making for. I continued along the cliff top path, skirting the churchyard, until the panoramic view gave way to a wooded area. A rusted iron fence ran along beside the footpath, perhaps to stop people straying on to the hazardous slope. And here was the scene of the slow-paced but violent drama that had grabbed my attention six years before. In 2011, on a bright, summery afternoon, this is what I saw (left) . . .</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_nbAOXJZLwEqWNrWHQYI_UWlwFsVPxq2Yc4UAplM1Jt-cNZtF-dzFOAfwCOyYDgP39zAb95JYAZ_S124VHL9LtlhOVHzJihllMwPMOBrNyIzq0wAp6LJ9YKE-zspk-Pxr0YfrBY3m_sms/s1600/Kirkby+Lonsdale+fence.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_nbAOXJZLwEqWNrWHQYI_UWlwFsVPxq2Yc4UAplM1Jt-cNZtF-dzFOAfwCOyYDgP39zAb95JYAZ_S124VHL9LtlhOVHzJihllMwPMOBrNyIzq0wAp6LJ9YKE-zspk-Pxr0YfrBY3m_sms/s200/Kirkby+Lonsdale+fence.JPG" width="200" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> . . . but the first time I'd been there it was a dark, showery day, and with the camera I had at the time I'd had to use a flash, so the scene looked more like this (right) and correspondingly more sinister.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfIvYKWujwI4_U7Z7-Cu5yutNXABDnD615j-T2sDXkPH_1-haLSOKmFbQFWCKkRx_cx3aPg0pU-tQ_dIjfGYpwuKI6Hy7sMa0v3wBn5wk2hgN6dyNYldaYDwbEQnDa46Ghrf9XmkTyOVT6/s1600/Encroachment+horiz.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfIvYKWujwI4_U7Z7-Cu5yutNXABDnD615j-T2sDXkPH_1-haLSOKmFbQFWCKkRx_cx3aPg0pU-tQ_dIjfGYpwuKI6Hy7sMa0v3wBn5wk2hgN6dyNYldaYDwbEQnDa46Ghrf9XmkTyOVT6/s200/Encroachment+horiz.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">You have to look closely--this is definitely a case of the devil being in the details. The fence must have been erected when the tree was much younger. Maybe it was even here in Ruskin's day--who knows? In any case, the tree expanded outwards and became viciously impaled on the rusted spikes of the fence, which, though bent out of shape, remained firmly in place and poked through the bark. The roots continued to spread through<b> </b>the fence on to the "civilized" side, like monstrous toes trying to escape from jail.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Back in the studio in 2007 I painted three versions of this protracted border war in which nature pits herself against human beings for control of a few feet of woodland. Neither side seems to be winning and the tree has probably by now reached its full size, though I suspect the ogre's toes will keep trying to inch forward. As I painted I was thinking all the time about man-versus-nature confrontations, overlaps and conflicts. Here are the results, each 24 x36 ins.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcB-ACt3bgKeTD4JGnL9-LiKRlhuhFZIyc-qlReZIxoQjFTzYgaAkiwkV8OBd_9VIUogwMDCpf6yPDJ3ylly1XzM0j9RfsSN1m6gcb_SD4VxwzsDvzCeEneIfivxWPL0sq3m-mxEZiuqoD/s1600/Encroachment+I+-+Toehold.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcB-ACt3bgKeTD4JGnL9-LiKRlhuhFZIyc-qlReZIxoQjFTzYgaAkiwkV8OBd_9VIUogwMDCpf6yPDJ3ylly1XzM0j9RfsSN1m6gcb_SD4VxwzsDvzCeEneIfivxWPL0sq3m-mxEZiuqoD/s320/Encroachment+I+-+Toehold.jpg" width="211" /></a></td></tr>
<tr style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i><span style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;">Encroachment 1: Toehold</span></i></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ9cWmdzvyBJ4SRFpUlpdZN55zmFakAXvJasx0wXXVI_zr9j02dAsGdPzv-wZjRww1_OZwTf9sTIIWAzYPmybdoNk1MMpMCKGFXUmhugJlnlh6FclSYOi0JnHxW04NpNelUsS3I9qKXU2O/s1600/Encroachment+III+-+Staked+out.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ9cWmdzvyBJ4SRFpUlpdZN55zmFakAXvJasx0wXXVI_zr9j02dAsGdPzv-wZjRww1_OZwTf9sTIIWAzYPmybdoNk1MMpMCKGFXUmhugJlnlh6FclSYOi0JnHxW04NpNelUsS3I9qKXU2O/s320/Encroachment+III+-+Staked+out.jpg" width="211" /></a></td></tr>
<tr style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Encroachment 3: Staked Out </i></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV-GpI_5w__b5d6NXJKAQJczlLrRlxAxenGW60vbUsaWdmDlWvZzWn99iLZjARuy6XKUV5oqky-3A6Z67y70g9huIOYLHPJzIucHg73SQeqdYK9Efxf47cAq0lVWpTAdsPpQT3OJi3yHFQ/s1600/Encoachment++II+-+Boundary+Fence.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="211" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV-GpI_5w__b5d6NXJKAQJczlLrRlxAxenGW60vbUsaWdmDlWvZzWn99iLZjARuy6XKUV5oqky-3A6Z67y70g9huIOYLHPJzIucHg73SQeqdYK9Efxf47cAq0lVWpTAdsPpQT3OJi3yHFQ/s320/Encoachment++II+-+Boundary+Fence.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Encroachment 2: Boundary Fence </i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXMpyY43n7SCP21EIe9z7SWVkr-goUYVamYRaKtluJ2VnFIT1FYyA4IKtbSDvJ02oe6Nm7HlIeBcWzPCqnNVVs1xQRWvPazUMzql3hjKAtbqI3tePCLl0JJAeQyeMaXN0a26BKJ2xfYt_u/s1600/Ouch.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXMpyY43n7SCP21EIe9z7SWVkr-goUYVamYRaKtluJ2VnFIT1FYyA4IKtbSDvJ02oe6Nm7HlIeBcWzPCqnNVVs1xQRWvPazUMzql3hjKAtbqI3tePCLl0JJAeQyeMaXN0a26BKJ2xfYt_u/s200/Ouch.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Ouch!</i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_sVpakMndDOnKqefuELERWmuvGb-n0vwOa-3JrFFAUsmUXSDBTMVxHgxuucppcYawQifhSa1ZX_XdUPimEvupnX5NwIwEpTWGine4xYmdwnMPvUMQYiH2LwaG20vJKF0yussH75CMdoUI/s1600/Embedded.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_sVpakMndDOnKqefuELERWmuvGb-n0vwOa-3JrFFAUsmUXSDBTMVxHgxuucppcYawQifhSa1ZX_XdUPimEvupnX5NwIwEpTWGine4xYmdwnMPvUMQYiH2LwaG20vJKF0yussH75CMdoUI/s200/Embedded.jpg" width="150" /></a></td></tr>
<tr style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">Embedded</span></i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This unlikely subject caught my imagination and I felt a real compulsion to paint it. As with my later painting "The Tree that almost Brained Me" (please see this blog Feb. 7, 2011) I wanted both to paint a realistic tree but also to represent the forest monster which, after all, I hadn't invented: there it was! I think I did an adequate job and took the work as far as I could at the time, but I wasn't altogether satisfied with the results. Perhaps that was why I wanted to return to the scene. A year ago I took more photos, closer up this time, and at some point I may make more paintings, based on images like these.</span><br />
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<tr style="font-family: Times,"Times New Roman",serif;"><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Foot of Tree</i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Next blog post in about a month.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a><i> </i> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-49612637330526818132012-04-12T19:41:00.000-07:002012-04-12T19:41:14.742-07:00Reflecting on Reflections: "Watery World" Series<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Like many artists I produce many more paintings than I sell. Maybe some time that will change, but in the meantime, what to do with all the inventory is a head-scratching challenge. I like to have my most recent work on the wall, partly so that, if it does eventually sell, I will have been able to enjoy it a bit first, and partly because faults that need fixing sometimes show up. It's much better to correct a bit of bad drawing or an ambiguous patch of colour while the painting is still in my possession, rather than in a purchaser's home or, worse still, in a gallery! Still, there's a limit to how much my home and studio walls will bear, and the remaining paintings end up stashed in closets and propped several deep behind my studio furniture. </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">At present <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">this is the fate of</span></span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">most of last year's work, a series of paintings of reflections in water. I wrote about some of them in this blog in September 2011, remarking that my interest shifted from seeing reflections as part of a larger scene to fascination with the reflections in their own right, independent of the things being reflected.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV17wsuIrv4KiSa_L5tIJejcopufehdL9kUOkVswFxnAq1RWPnICgUZpNO-UAcu5bLnUqyeZCvhuKQrzQLwGSbKhcWQQGU9HFz21-LPS6nW4qsXUn0ID1UULoSUl3S0iP3UQLs2stdqtTJ/s1600/Forest+Pond+27x42+2011.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="204" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV17wsuIrv4KiSa_L5tIJejcopufehdL9kUOkVswFxnAq1RWPnICgUZpNO-UAcu5bLnUqyeZCvhuKQrzQLwGSbKhcWQQGU9HFz21-LPS6nW4qsXUn0ID1UULoSUl3S0iP3UQLs2stdqtTJ/s320/Forest+Pond+27x42+2011.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Forest Pond </i>- acrylic - 27" x 42" - 2011</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"Forest Pond" was an important transitional step. As I worked on this, for me, quite large painting, I realized at some point that I couldn't tell exactly where the water level was, so that I couldn't be sure what was "real" and what was the reflected image.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">As I continued to study reflections in different bodies of water--pools, streams, lakes--I became engrossed in the shifting, unstable, looking-glass world beneath my feet. Anything could happen down there: there was no need for rational explanations. This was very liberating, since I was free to imagine and invent. After all, nothing was "real"--it was just an image, and an unreliable one at that, subject to fragmentation by a sudden gust of wind or sprinkle of rain. On the other hand, standing on the edge of water and gazing down was somewhat dizzying. I suppose it induced a kind of vertigo. I thought it might be a challenge to paint reflections without making a viewer feel queasy and disoriented. At first I myself kept getting confused about which way was up! As I continued, however, I sought out the little cues that differentiate a reflection from above-water reality--the surface ripple, the sky poking through at the <b>bottom</b> of the composition, things on the bed of the pond or stream intruding into the reflections.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqBktqGcPXHByU8ZeHVY_flE7zmWPcsIdVLFjrq3BlS_bkEH66rkWoO_r9NvKBhdulBXWKjwOQLQoYWQXaGiJXi2joBqveukEdydlcklQ1Aax2PtXxuiy72fSu-xIpgIV93LqrMv08JHP-/s1600/Watery+World+2+2011+24x30.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="252" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqBktqGcPXHByU8ZeHVY_flE7zmWPcsIdVLFjrq3BlS_bkEH66rkWoO_r9NvKBhdulBXWKjwOQLQoYWQXaGiJXi2joBqveukEdydlcklQ1Aax2PtXxuiy72fSu-xIpgIV93LqrMv08JHP-/s320/Watery+World+2+2011+24x30.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Watery World 2 - </i>acrylic - 24" x 30" - 2011</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrlWFEtOYR1QdtGGK-6173-lrYsjl8EVaDnGNdNS7ec7H76xNGE9jYXa3oHT217HI8StpgM6xgnBTyT6QYV58dK4QaHL8wvntJd2Zthwgp9t5ebplHRuLTEYfAykbh2vTx4nGrrBAGm6CT/s1600/Watery+World+3+2011+30x24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrlWFEtOYR1QdtGGK-6173-lrYsjl8EVaDnGNdNS7ec7H76xNGE9jYXa3oHT217HI8StpgM6xgnBTyT6QYV58dK4QaHL8wvntJd2Zthwgp9t5ebplHRuLTEYfAykbh2vTx4nGrrBAGm6CT/s320/Watery+World+3+2011+30x24.jpg" width="255" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Watery World 3 -</i> acrylic - 24" x 30" - 2011</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I began with three variations on a pond in Stanley Park in Vancouver. It was a summer day, and the pond was in a wooded area, with dappled sunlight catching some of the branches. A little waterfall trickled over a rock, wiggling the reflected conifer needles and crinkling hard edges, but the surface was still enough to make an almost perfect mirror image.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Next I tackled two images of reflections in moving water. These turned into more abstract compositions because the wind on the lake, in one case, and the swift current of the river in the other, splintered and distorted the image.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC5wvSK_qmf2rjGNL3uXaHuTUIMLDM85r6Xf8JsxrrwCYN_X3x8Ba60l1C-NJNvN5OYZ-Phy4mDptcYsXYF1K3WqQdWgMbn-AYVPqCo6Dj6f0xZ7Bw_6p8KyeomXIUNyEIWRoFIhyviFUB/s1600/Watery+World+5+2011+24x30.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="257" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiC5wvSK_qmf2rjGNL3uXaHuTUIMLDM85r6Xf8JsxrrwCYN_X3x8Ba60l1C-NJNvN5OYZ-Phy4mDptcYsXYF1K3WqQdWgMbn-AYVPqCo6Dj6f0xZ7Bw_6p8KyeomXIUNyEIWRoFIhyviFUB/s320/Watery+World+5+2011+24x30.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Watery World 5 - </i>acrylic - 24" x 30" - 2011</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL_sBDlwWdYtMDhcUCKvJl7ifLr_-A27ulkJ-0sVmvCVkC15gzizy_q6yslOC2l5qhvyXmnnf6f6giRD13BGTWOqtiY3PTtHMAXaP2wH7UpSinxPaq0f6GkfLk35qxFXa1fi1Lx5CxZElz/s1600/Watery+World+4+2011+30x24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL_sBDlwWdYtMDhcUCKvJl7ifLr_-A27ulkJ-0sVmvCVkC15gzizy_q6yslOC2l5qhvyXmnnf6f6giRD13BGTWOqtiY3PTtHMAXaP2wH7UpSinxPaq0f6GkfLk35qxFXa1fi1Lx5CxZElz/s320/Watery+World+4+2011+30x24.jpg" width="250" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Watery World 4 </i>- acrylic - 30" x 24" - 2011 </td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">These two paintings happen to be based on photos I took in different places in England, but with a project like this one the geography hardly matters. These are not site-specific landscapes. Reflections presumably behave the same way the world over! (Here I go off into a reverie about bath water spiralling in opposite directions in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. What would that do to reflections? And then there's that perplexing question: where is the dividing line where the water starts to swirl the other way . . . ? Having spent two weeks in Quito I can attest to the fact that nothing dramatic happens right <b>on </b>the equator.)</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdUTdTX57Noe7hj2OwHq8_LJv0SfccM96VzXd0M5uu0YdGMhObvnIfLgBh02bhYWLySpH9rjZ4uV1nJl7qON0Y_z5MLc2HxcBNk1AyIYD8I2sKZZPuNCKIpIw7aKFwzTPwtwqfIzusFsFA/s1600/Watery+World+6+2011+24x30.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdUTdTX57Noe7hj2OwHq8_LJv0SfccM96VzXd0M5uu0YdGMhObvnIfLgBh02bhYWLySpH9rjZ4uV1nJl7qON0Y_z5MLc2HxcBNk1AyIYD8I2sKZZPuNCKIpIw7aKFwzTPwtwqfIzusFsFA/s320/Watery+World+6+2011+24x30.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Watery World 6 </i>- acrylic - 24" x 30" - 2011</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The next two "Watery Worlds" were located in yet another part of England. This time I was walking alongside a little stream in rain that fell intermittently as fine drizzle and a soaking downpour. It was the middle of June, and chilly. The stream was described as a "winterbourne", which means that it often dries up in summer. Not too much chance of that the year I was there. The lush vegetation that lined the banks included the copper beeches that show in the paintings as purple leaves.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Watery World 7 </i>- acrylic - 24" x 30" - 2011</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Watery World 7 </i>suffered a misfortune in my studio just before the 2011 Eastside Culture Crawl. My year's work was hanging on the walls, with the exception of the work-in-progress, which was on the easel. As I worked on this painting the big studio easel suddenly collapsed and folded itself up, crashing into No. 7 and tearing a two-inch gash in the canvas. Afterwards I realized that a screw at the back of the easel that I hadn't adjusted in months must have worked its way loose. I patched the painting on the back with a square of canvas and lots of acrylic medium, and touched up the paint. It really doesn't show, but of course, if someone wants to buy it I'll have to reduce the price.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixfHhRWPHiOX74fFj5jds4X4p6d8_ja7FhIDlUWY0gawcaTXxd8k9mJDCxwZqXcs9swzwBlhD3gfMdys_-cBFd4ShpKQcmS5IUhDRehCLxvVLhX5EE6jtZGSIQoFDUoyWXFE9q_0gBKrRV/s1600/Watery+World+8+2011+30x24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixfHhRWPHiOX74fFj5jds4X4p6d8_ja7FhIDlUWY0gawcaTXxd8k9mJDCxwZqXcs9swzwBlhD3gfMdys_-cBFd4ShpKQcmS5IUhDRehCLxvVLhX5EE6jtZGSIQoFDUoyWXFE9q_0gBKrRV/s200/Watery+World+8+2011+30x24.jpg" width="160" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Watery World 8</i> - acrylic - 30" x 24" - 2011</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Nos. 8, 9 and 10 are back in Stanley Park. They are all reflections in the ornamental pool in the garden outside the dining pavilion. There are tall conifers growing there but also more exotic plants like the giant gunnera in No. 8 and the red-leaved plant in No. 10. On this occasion the sun was shining, creating yellow bars on the water which faded out the reflections and let the bed of the pool show through.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA3vlTjvGu44wPMn4pbVLhqWMwqhMiDJWu9WBY1hHMkGv7UZLVW1MGcF8Gt9ciPtDTbKhXWXj6mcTwXiqAFW2WjABxgxG8sSouXJ8vETLMfvsvQINxp-wzNikdLb3fA0_tZuTkWU3mzgZX/s1600/Watery+World+10+2011+24x30.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="254" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA3vlTjvGu44wPMn4pbVLhqWMwqhMiDJWu9WBY1hHMkGv7UZLVW1MGcF8Gt9ciPtDTbKhXWXj6mcTwXiqAFW2WjABxgxG8sSouXJ8vETLMfvsvQINxp-wzNikdLb3fA0_tZuTkWU3mzgZX/s320/Watery+World+10+2011+24x30.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Watery World 10</i> - acrylic - 24" x 30" - 2011</td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggj6ctw7Q2OiIwTmPx1BMOt_mppqiKKBXcphPMXmgnQMoh2uSoVjtScoXsQkwIRsx8xbvq6B-JME-Ca2hVYBN-aJdqUOH33NGcWRz5g7sAqcUCMBiOQ-xRbamwFSTCiFIAeha0pJK1xpEN/s1600/Watery+World+9+2011+30x24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><i style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Next blog post will be in June</i><br />
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</span>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-79645849037523563522012-03-01T20:23:00.000-08:002012-03-01T20:23:45.001-08:00Getting Going Again: "Vincent's Mutants"<div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I got off to a slow start this year, but now I'm back to painting after a lengthy break. I was out of the country, first in England for Christmas, then in Mexico, and in neither place did I engage in any art activity, except for taking a few photos. My blog lapsed too, while I waited for the urge to write to come back. As I wrote in December, in "The Tyranny of Tinsel," I've told most of the stories associated with my inventory of paintings, so any blog writing will have more to do with recent and current art activities than with the past. Perhaps this year the title "Easel Talk", which I chose in haste just over a year ago, will be a more accurate descriptor, although my first idea, "Easel Thoughts", which I think was rejected by Google as already taken, might be even better.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuiH5maWxorJtPD0lRXffDMq23vU8JIcnRjhUC7M1dLzifkze5KmJ_tbr1XgFVpMvXU4bVCnRtP6QKXJ4O3FJML8ryF1TXE0vW5FoYq7DaFo0VNW85DDQX1AqIaQF3TOmzQy_eibuHiQN8/s1600/Mt.+Seymour+at+Sunset.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuiH5maWxorJtPD0lRXffDMq23vU8JIcnRjhUC7M1dLzifkze5KmJ_tbr1XgFVpMvXU4bVCnRtP6QKXJ4O3FJML8ryF1TXE0vW5FoYq7DaFo0VNW85DDQX1AqIaQF3TOmzQy_eibuHiQN8/s200/Mt.+Seymour+at+Sunset.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Mt. Seymour at Sunset -</i> acrylic - 20" x 20" - 2012<br />
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</tbody></table>Back in the studio, I first finished off an addition to my "In Praise of November" series called "Mt. Seymour at Sunset." On the day after a heavy fall of snow, the North Shore mountains, as seen from my balcony, were an improbable shade of pink as they caught the setting sun. In contrast, the shadows on the lower slopes appeared startlingly blue. <br />
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Next came three small paintings on a theme proposed by my friend and studio mate Eva Wideman for this year's group project for Vancouver Sketch Club members. We settled on the title "Quotes from the Masters." The idea is to refer in some way to a famous painting, without exactly copying it. We thought this would be both fun and a learning experience.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimAdrPoA3zS0bXzHjSac5vQVexYNdkg4ebXJJdtu3pWWOthMs2v0sf-8Fc0xIMpWCb5J5ZeNmnOENI9uJNuj4tIqeCszDeEdmA6FBUWQrBbL_Uv_5s1UmNyB4m0URV6cR8lIMP53xrsq4y/s1600/Sunflowers+reversed.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimAdrPoA3zS0bXzHjSac5vQVexYNdkg4ebXJJdtu3pWWOthMs2v0sf-8Fc0xIMpWCb5J5ZeNmnOENI9uJNuj4tIqeCszDeEdmA6FBUWQrBbL_Uv_5s1UmNyB4m0URV6cR8lIMP53xrsq4y/s200/Sunflowers+reversed.jpg" width="160" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Negative image</td></tr>
</tbody></table>The "quoting" could be done in many ways, but I chose to model my work on three of Van Gogh's iconic images, but in their complementary, or reversed, colours. This turned out to be a fascinating and challenging project. First I tackled the famous sunflowers, which Van Gogh painted a number of times. I used a print of the version in the National Gallery in London. To view please go to <a href="http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/vincent-van-gogh-sunflowers">www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/vincent-van-gogh-sunflowers</a> . My first step was to print out a negative of the print, which gave me the reversed colours. However, I wanted to keep the tonal values as close as possible to the original, not have the lights and darks reversed, so next I made a greyscale print.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9EsqNJJpkqEktLz2rT71rVqFwxn66Od_IH2zlH0vF5N2pRAP8l2zN58OMD3AggHLGvhpbjxpfiLbRLcPZhWYoDVbQC1jjcYFC4brwv3hvX8G2vOaSlL-pfvL1YAxPHa9CnrVvOn5x2y8K/s1600/Sunflowers+grey.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9EsqNJJpkqEktLz2rT71rVqFwxn66Od_IH2zlH0vF5N2pRAP8l2zN58OMD3AggHLGvhpbjxpfiLbRLcPZhWYoDVbQC1jjcYFC4brwv3hvX8G2vOaSlL-pfvL1YAxPHa9CnrVvOn5x2y8K/s200/Sunflowers+grey.jpg" width="160" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Greyscale image</td></tr>
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Finally, after a preparatory drawing, I started painting on a 18" x 14" canvas, about half the size of Van Gogh's.<br />
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The project turned into a colour exercise more demanding than any I'd encountered since my first year colour course at art school. I also had to use a lot of imagination. I was thinking all the time about colour theory, the colour wheel, complementary colours--the very issues that Van Gogh himself had wrestled with. But one problem that Vincent didn't have was deciding <b>which</b> colour wheel to use. For him the primary colours were red, yellow, blue, and their complementaries, on the opposite side of the wheel, were green, violet and orange. My computer and printer go by a different colour system, in which the primaries are yellow, magenta, cyan, and their complementaries blue, green and red. I tied myself up in knots trying to decide which way to jump, and in the end, inevitably, I went by intuition and used the colours that seemed to work best. Another issue that had not previously occurred to me was the relative "heat" of the hues. Warm colours, the reds and oranges, appear to come forward in a painting, while the cool blues and greens recede. But I didn't want my sunflowers to recede like shrinking violets, so I had to make the blues as vibrant as possible. Of course, I was also working from a little print, which may or may not be an accurate representation of the original colours. And finally--a consideration that didn't occur to me until I'd almost finished the project--I have cataracts that may require surgery later this year, so I actually have no idea whether I'm seeing colours as other people do, and maybe this wasn't the year to be doing this kind of work! Anyway, here is my first "Mutant":</div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrSFaG5IkHkPE0cFqkWTEc-ehSQvfCR7975ru-aDJq9CqsJ-KQVkyk6VPqt7M0v6ApJLt3IJJd4_YO9TKc3eX7ozHdVc57nZCYi3Qubyg8b_wdlpp6HQs1zRrdKnIdM_CeRm6QYLhUxI5c/s1600/Blue+Sunflowers+18x14+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrSFaG5IkHkPE0cFqkWTEc-ehSQvfCR7975ru-aDJq9CqsJ-KQVkyk6VPqt7M0v6ApJLt3IJJd4_YO9TKc3eX7ozHdVc57nZCYi3Qubyg8b_wdlpp6HQs1zRrdKnIdM_CeRm6QYLhUxI5c/s320/Blue+Sunflowers+18x14+2012.jpg" width="248" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Blue Sunflowers </i>- acrylic - 18"x 14" - 2012</td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I went on to follow the same procedure with "The Yellow Chair" and "The Sower,"<br />
<a href="http://www.vggallery.com/painting/p_0498_0499.htm">www.vggallery.com/painting/p_0498_0499.htm</a><br />
<a href="http://www.vangoghmuseum.nl/vgm/index.jsp?page=4500&lang+en">www.vangoghmuseum.nl/vgm/index.jsp?page=4500&lang+en</a> with these results:</div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6Owq3wTaJfCgOXgVnlG7jCZ_SuD3S3emmHFgNjcNOO-jyWYFY9jeOLUdc36oxnRyTe-JfN7T6AFJ3oClB3jpEIXeKOdvXGNAUoJk7o2mhyphenhyphenqL6dhJDRLVH8ZMaYOfQeR6npHw1GPGOSOky/s1600/Blue+Chair+18x14+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6Owq3wTaJfCgOXgVnlG7jCZ_SuD3S3emmHFgNjcNOO-jyWYFY9jeOLUdc36oxnRyTe-JfN7T6AFJ3oClB3jpEIXeKOdvXGNAUoJk7o2mhyphenhyphenqL6dhJDRLVH8ZMaYOfQeR6npHw1GPGOSOky/s320/Blue+Chair+18x14+2012.jpg" width="251" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Blue Chair</i> - acrylic - 18" x 14" - 2012</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-usSn-zcXXfRS9hD7AXvr-zQ6WhCg9MztsLO6QeIUc3vGMhksipfF0WAzxLsixCSrErS0pkFubPzL38A4YZ2c1BxcRaCURhM5zk5Amnru1-SeSid8ksnumMJsS6UrqOqgpFjzu8Ci6eaT/s1600/Blue+Moon+14x18+2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-usSn-zcXXfRS9hD7AXvr-zQ6WhCg9MztsLO6QeIUc3vGMhksipfF0WAzxLsixCSrErS0pkFubPzL38A4YZ2c1BxcRaCURhM5zk5Amnru1-SeSid8ksnumMJsS6UrqOqgpFjzu8Ci6eaT/s320/Blue+Moon+14x18+2012.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Blue Moon</i> - acrylic - 14" x 18" - 2012</td></tr>
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</div><div style="text-align: left;">Having completed four paintings and made a good start on two more, I feel really back in harness. Next blog post in about a month! </div><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/the.vancouver.sketch.club">www.myartclub.com/the.vancouver.sketch.club</a></div><div style="text-align: center;"> <a href="http://www.myartclub.com/eva.wideman">www.myartclub.com/eva.wideman</a></div></div></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-69518416212403021422011-12-20T10:33:00.000-08:002011-12-20T10:33:28.295-08:00The Tyranny of Tinsel<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">From Monday to Saturday each week I read the comic strips in the local paper. I have a huge admiration for the artists who keep their strips going day after day, month after month, year after year. One of my favourites is "Cul de Sac" by Richard Thompson, a family saga featuring a repressed, nerdy little boy and his little sister, who has a Type A personality and no inhibitions at all. In a recent strip, when preparations for Christmas were getting going, the boy stuck a tatty bit of last year's tree trim on the ceiling, and called it his "Tinsel of Damocles." This inspired phrase has kept me company since the moment I read it. Essentially, it encapsulates the same sentiments as I expressed in my painting "A Long Wait" (please see last month's post). The sad fact is that apart from the few years when my children were children and I had to be a closet Santa Claus, I am not very good at Christmas. My malaise started the year I moved to Canada. In December I went to California to visit some family connections, not quite blood relations, with whom my grandmother had exchanged the occasional letter. On Christmas Eve, I of the iron stomach suffered an acute and embarrassing attack of nausea. Fortunately I recovered quickly enough to enjoy the turkey dinner the next day, but for several years after that I came down with some ailment just in time for Christmas. Usually it was a streaming cold or a digestive upset, but one year it was a full-blown flu that hit just as I got home with a mountain of festive food, none of which I could even look at.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In recent years my seasonal indisposition has taken the form of the November blahs (again, see last month) and an ostrich-like denial that Christmas will ever come at all. This is accompanied by a slump in my energy level, which is never too elevated in the first place. Then, at the last minute, the mood lifts and I suddenly spring into action, sending off cards, shopping like crazy just when most things have sold out, and putting up a few token lights and decorations. Oddly enough, and touch wood, the physical ailments are a thing of the past, and I have no trouble enjoying Christmas when it actually arrives.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This year my "tinsel of Damocles" has had an extra strand dangling ominously over my head: the weighty responsibility of having to write a blog post. I know no one's festivities are going to be wrecked if my readers don't hear from me--they're probably much too busy to care--but my own self-respect requires that I deliver on the promise I made last month to write a new instalment mid-December. And here I am, well past the mid-point of the month, still procrastinating. The trouble is that, since starting this blog since February, I have already written about most of my inventory of paintings, or at any rate those that have stories associated with them. So perhaps it's time for the blog either to end, or to evolve into more of an ongoing journal about what I do in the studio. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">While I think about this question, I'm signing off for 2011 with a painting done earlier this year. It's the one I'm using this year as my paper Christmas card, and comes to all my readers with my best wishes for Christmas etc. and 2012, and with my heartfelt thanks for your support and encouragement of both my painting and my blogging efforts.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5TBHvVqYKiMxMcFhinKJa3du9Q7lX5KnscewEwPHVnPMXCIg5fnmLKQuddVBTKxbknEKjVbw4WAOAbvhyphenhyphen7XZgOhbVnIDW-jjsg3RBAUda2J5OKqQepWlvQqTqzq_daMH4JdL9Qw2VswvJ/s1600/First+Snow+24x18+2011.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5TBHvVqYKiMxMcFhinKJa3du9Q7lX5KnscewEwPHVnPMXCIg5fnmLKQuddVBTKxbknEKjVbw4WAOAbvhyphenhyphen7XZgOhbVnIDW-jjsg3RBAUda2J5OKqQepWlvQqTqzq_daMH4JdL9Qw2VswvJ/s320/First+Snow+24x18+2011.jpg" width="238" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>First Snow</i> - acrylic - 24" x 18" - 2011</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br />
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</tbody></table><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Next blog post? We'll see! </i> </span></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-7755869614460028572011-11-12T20:36:00.000-08:002011-11-14T16:45:03.497-08:00The Colours of November: Not Only Grey!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
</div><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Thirty days hath November . . . and in a typical year, here in the rain forest, most of them are wet and dreary</span>. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">As I explained earlier this year (Please see "Painting in a Wet Climate", Feb. 27) I've been collecting photographic images of November, and later painting from them, for several years now. I began doing this to stave off the seasonal depression which I associated with the weeks leading up to Christmas, and was pleasantly surprised to find that there was no shortage of colourful painting material to be discovered.</span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjuRn5Fd6UWeDfSH0m5cmEDH5WY9Qr0R654eKkdh4nofIxzLh_JyVS6oCnXbWplQ_gqRgvOzP3vifRSHF0Ixo76Vr-yx8hNvmOdYQ1viMPM6GKI1pLrYy3SZ9BIR7ZIF5XESBDbZwMCpmI/s1600/Apres-Halloween+light-fill+hair.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="193" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjuRn5Fd6UWeDfSH0m5cmEDH5WY9Qr0R654eKkdh4nofIxzLh_JyVS6oCnXbWplQ_gqRgvOzP3vifRSHF0Ixo76Vr-yx8hNvmOdYQ1viMPM6GKI1pLrYy3SZ9BIR7ZIF5XESBDbZwMCpmI/s200/Apres-Halloween+light-fill+hair.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">So here we are, in November again, and I'm at the planning stage of another painting on the theme "In Praise of November," based on a photo I took last year. It's an odd image, a "witch" crudely crafted from a child's hockey stick, a store-bought mask, and duct tape. Evidently this creation was thrown negligently aside once Halloween was over. I spotted her lying recumbent on a chafer-ravaged front lawn, grinning complacently at the sky. </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVZI4aRo_DQ_ncrjb1qsgK0Y3nUevPFbLwNqrvdtm2Mr3Ofkd_b8NaBo_n8QLFFX3GQN2G-nR9v-_XYC0Goxub7LlxD4kESMW5AliFmmD2532iyKj7yMO1acpd7AeaIksonQNkg7iEIOop/s1600/Gunnera.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVZI4aRo_DQ_ncrjb1qsgK0Y3nUevPFbLwNqrvdtm2Mr3Ofkd_b8NaBo_n8QLFFX3GQN2G-nR9v-_XYC0Goxub7LlxD4kESMW5AliFmmD2532iyKj7yMO1acpd7AeaIksonQNkg7iEIOop/s200/Gunnera.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Meanwhile I'm again taking photos of anything that strikes me, and have added to my collection some mouldering hosta leaves, a seagull sitting on an industrial chimney, and a litter of fallen crab-apples. This year it's not hard to find bright colours, as in this image of a heap of gunnera leaves photographed today in Queen Elizabeth Park. With a third of November already gone, we've yet to have a sharp frost, a gale or a serious downpour, and the trees have kept their leaves much longer than usual.</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Although the native trees tend to have yellow leaves rather than the brilliant reds of Eastern Canada, there are enough exotic ornamentals in Vancouver to provide an impressive range of hues.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXEP5haGAPxsCeWlintuhSRjCQ_f4Ad8QNdDfkpeWBbl26RitV-_WXW0AlH_5r0kqbHroXp79dyCybxtD16BjmHjijqvG5_SQb2V5jOKyhSmtZglgCgXtqFtfhyphenhyphenNAs4ihm6Hy7mYB1cQn0/s1600/1+A+long+wait++24x18+2009.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXEP5haGAPxsCeWlintuhSRjCQ_f4Ad8QNdDfkpeWBbl26RitV-_WXW0AlH_5r0kqbHroXp79dyCybxtD16BjmHjijqvG5_SQb2V5jOKyhSmtZglgCgXtqFtfhyphenhyphenNAs4ihm6Hy7mYB1cQn0/s200/1+A+long+wait++24x18+2009.jpg" width="149" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>A Long Wait -</i> acrylic - 2009 - 18" x 24"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">My first November painting is called "A Long Wait." I took the photo from the window of a waterfront restaurant on Vancouver Island. The old seaman isn't a real person, but a wood carving, one of a group of figures. I don't know anything about the sculptor--if you do, please pass on the information. Whatever the old man is waiting for--his ship to come in, perhaps?-- combined itself in my mind with the long wait for Christmas when decorations go up right after Halloween, or even sooner, and look tired and tawdry long before the actual holiday. To me, Christmas in November seems as hopeless as standing in the rain and looking out to sea.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4cKIi7F6IPNkpnGNlPBEFTaw0jupUeXDjpDGOi7jluG1IO_0n-MRd5kuHivtJdYAFm8qcQHq8tNkRNcojJEWqBqBj9DV9fKUsYmLXt_VA-onid3VNLwzovLkrBXJH81XfvXom6YW8kqyQ/s1600/4+Last+of+the+Leaves+20x20+2009.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4cKIi7F6IPNkpnGNlPBEFTaw0jupUeXDjpDGOi7jluG1IO_0n-MRd5kuHivtJdYAFm8qcQHq8tNkRNcojJEWqBqBj9DV9fKUsYmLXt_VA-onid3VNLwzovLkrBXJH81XfvXom6YW8kqyQ/s320/4+Last+of+the+Leaves+20x20+2009.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Last of the Leaves </i>- acrylic - 2009 - 20" x 20"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In spite of the stereotyped notion of November as rainy, the weather can actually vary from mild and benign, like today, through fog, hail and rain, to heavy, though usually short-lived, snow. Several of my November paintings feature trees or other vegetation in various types of weather. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWqxLocpnIXwHzs19tYgE6JO_4pGnRD5PpVrUf-9XKjdAhN5xrPXWbArRdVHsyR-0X3WZYBdG-64EETnNuEbB19nD8gixt8MXXCgvGktfuYldKow6US5AK5fJUaVndbzH3WUilQ0u0bJYa/s1600/3+November+Snow+20x20+2009.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWqxLocpnIXwHzs19tYgE6JO_4pGnRD5PpVrUf-9XKjdAhN5xrPXWbArRdVHsyR-0X3WZYBdG-64EETnNuEbB19nD8gixt8MXXCgvGktfuYldKow6US5AK5fJUaVndbzH3WUilQ0u0bJYa/s320/3+November+Snow+20x20+2009.jpg" width="313" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>November Snow</i> - acrylic - 2009 - 20" x 20"</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy8DHNizX1ndgI4UsUj9q1KXxn-w2-4nr_h1V_slG4KRoNkbDz5NnfF83ltbWyEi6poyZJrmQm33bef6E6ibuYQAdLHy247RrMBJ-bHL0iyA15u80UcqYVjoBFVbknk7qP-qi16GJKbUha/s1600/2+After+the+Storm+18x24+2009.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy8DHNizX1ndgI4UsUj9q1KXxn-w2-4nr_h1V_slG4KRoNkbDz5NnfF83ltbWyEi6poyZJrmQm33bef6E6ibuYQAdLHy247RrMBJ-bHL0iyA15u80UcqYVjoBFVbknk7qP-qi16GJKbUha/s320/2+After+the+Storm+18x24+2009.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>After the Storm -</i> acrylic - 2009 - 18" x 24"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What a difference a couple of days can make! After Thursday's sunshine a sudden change brought strong winds and heavy rain. The mountains disappeared into the mist, the trees were stripped of their leaves, and this afternoon I drove back from the suburbs in sleet! Such abrupt changes prompted "After the Storm" and "November Rainbow." The former was a view of the western sky as seen from the Oakridge parking lot at twilight; and the rainbow appeared in the east one stormy evening, splitting the sky into blue and pink, and casting such an unearthly light on the buildings as the base of the arc that the old tale about the crock of gold seemed entirely credible.</span></div><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihSWJpPcvHss2dnV-mzPwdWe-n0WF-kaaTVdLJGKoakLyOPxhPJRbjWBDNJcZ0LiZfe7rQad4A_poFcl3SebvfWMIkCFvxa4YbNVIYx3i4mi5WJswWxqVsRK1c-i7CPh-KD2hwkV8shzjR/s1600/7+November+Rainbow+24x18+2009.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEihSWJpPcvHss2dnV-mzPwdWe-n0WF-kaaTVdLJGKoakLyOPxhPJRbjWBDNJcZ0LiZfe7rQad4A_poFcl3SebvfWMIkCFvxa4YbNVIYx3i4mi5WJswWxqVsRK1c-i7CPh-KD2hwkV8shzjR/s320/7+November+Rainbow+24x18+2009.jpg" width="241" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>November Rainbow - </i>acrylic - 2009 - 24" x 18"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Next weekend I'll be taking part in the annual Eastside Culture Crawl for the seventh time. If you live in the Vancouver area I hope you will include our building, Portside Studios at 150 McLean Drive (northeast corner of Powell and McLean) on your itinerary. Here's a map, and you can check out the details at <a href="http://www.eastsideculturecrawl.com/">www.eastsideculturecrawl.com</a></span></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3BtnZAFJDDiKORUVp4hh-NXtl9z3V4KE9TO1qEoLxOzHbvt_XLnU_XKZUdlXklWtPSlkL2pG7-qeQrAWQt603Yttr_fiHQMy1F63MH9rk8t_lBGC1N-LvnFxfKebIph2UxmzZ6_2_FzfB/s1600/Crawl+map.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="295" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3BtnZAFJDDiKORUVp4hh-NXtl9z3V4KE9TO1qEoLxOzHbvt_XLnU_XKZUdlXklWtPSlkL2pG7-qeQrAWQt603Yttr_fiHQMy1F63MH9rk8t_lBGC1N-LvnFxfKebIph2UxmzZ6_2_FzfB/s320/Crawl+map.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Two November paintings that I will be showing at the Crawl this year are "Lakeside, November" and "Blizzard at Night." Please come and see the real thing!</span></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtEZ52E8Di_ByUmdGXFkxYbLAnrX1n7R3SJ8J3wFbcqrSUFDerCzKmH8_SJiRS9DetHiAXkaZTkuLyIWMfECTrb6g84oJLNRKMs_n6n0C_2fsIyXoEx298y2Pd50IjTkXqi30qxwjFrgxA/s1600/Lakeshore%252C+November+18x24+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="237" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtEZ52E8Di_ByUmdGXFkxYbLAnrX1n7R3SJ8J3wFbcqrSUFDerCzKmH8_SJiRS9DetHiAXkaZTkuLyIWMfECTrb6g84oJLNRKMs_n6n0C_2fsIyXoEx298y2Pd50IjTkXqi30qxwjFrgxA/s320/Lakeshore%252C+November+18x24+2010.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Lakeshore, November - </i>acrylic - 18" x 24" - 2010</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY5GNq14FO3UJecKIl58JmzXO0XNORWncXszIdLgNVWZ33oWerBLNT3EMwoSKazw9p3Bh1eE7vxzhdAO6XMuDZypcrPwbRAm8u0qtk-eUd4Li3BpRCMtEceHUV-BFFR95D948JbydO9_bs/s1600/12+Snowstorm+at+Night+20x30+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY5GNq14FO3UJecKIl58JmzXO0XNORWncXszIdLgNVWZ33oWerBLNT3EMwoSKazw9p3Bh1eE7vxzhdAO6XMuDZypcrPwbRAm8u0qtk-eUd4Li3BpRCMtEceHUV-BFFR95D948JbydO9_bs/s320/12+Snowstorm+at+Night+20x30+2010.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Blizzard at Night - </i>acrylic - 20" x 30" - 2010</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br />
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</tbody></table><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Next blog post mid-December</i></span></div><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span><br />
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</div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-9556635152337699792011-10-14T19:52:00.000-07:002011-10-14T19:52:21.293-07:00Pet Projects: A Cat, a Dog and a Lizard<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">A few years ago, at the annual Eastside Culture Crawl, a boy of ten or eleven came into the studio and stared for some time at my display of paintings</span>, <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">after which he offered me some advice:</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> "What I think you should do," he said, "is to paint pictures of puppies and kittens, because I think people would really like those, and would want to buy them." Of course, I thanked him for his suggestion, and I hope I was gentle enough in my attempt to explain that a great number of paintings of puppies and kittens have been produced in the world and that I prefer to choose more original subjects. What I probably did not add was that it is difficult to paint animals--particularly baby ones--without falling into the cloying sentimentality of pastel greetings cards and old-fashioned drawing-room pictures. </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It is, however,<b> possible</b>, as some of the masters have </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">shown: you don't have to be soppy about dogs to enjoy a little book called <i>David Hockney's Dog Days</i>--here's the cover:<i> </i></span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjapJGot23t0iynWon4wJevFUhnehd9sl4FtXLVtIixyBZj4HLRD0j5aPczmRwGvxDyZ4u5uqGwdlxejc2VXh913ebSH-ZrPAHGwp_-ThyphenhyphenZ-6bMlPG4JSjpODLSg0mHSUo1DyfSrHY2tGEb/s1600/IMG.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="142" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjapJGot23t0iynWon4wJevFUhnehd9sl4FtXLVtIixyBZj4HLRD0j5aPczmRwGvxDyZ4u5uqGwdlxejc2VXh913ebSH-ZrPAHGwp_-ThyphenhyphenZ-6bMlPG4JSjpODLSg0mHSUo1DyfSrHY2tGEb/s200/IMG.jpg" width="200" /></a></div><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Hockney's two little red dachsunds aren't sitting up begging with bows around their necks: in most of the paintings they are just stretched out asleep. Somehow the artist has made them delightful without being cute or uncanine. If I could paint puppies and kittens like that I think my young visitor might be proved right.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVYFofMp7rM2HMDuLwxz9r4aS9mbJN1kRLgvtfeHoa3dhIhJxVjGC1-g5w0lzlryVeGdV7gmj71HdCJ6VnZItE-nbMoulXothv70barkVxeqcxlS6Xbrvov5p9nHRqBYUdP7GVYmU8wiGf/s1600/The+Master.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="234" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVYFofMp7rM2HMDuLwxz9r4aS9mbJN1kRLgvtfeHoa3dhIhJxVjGC1-g5w0lzlryVeGdV7gmj71HdCJ6VnZItE-nbMoulXothv70barkVxeqcxlS6Xbrvov5p9nHRqBYUdP7GVYmU8wiGf/s320/The+Master.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Master - acrylic - 2005 </i></td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In spite of the pitfalls I have of course had a go at pets, though mostly not my own, and I am currently engaged in painting a black and white cat. Black fur presents a challenge, as it's hard to see enough detail, and flat black hardly ever looks right. I didn't have that problem with my own cat Stripes, whom I painted several years ago. As his name indicates, Stripes was a tabby, but his mother was a Siamese. He was the only survivor of his litter--the rest were stillborn or died after birth. The Siamese heritage combined with the indulgence he received from his mother and his human family in his infancy produced in Stripes a cat of great intelligence, character and mischief.</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Above all, he had Attitude. He was afraid of nothing, except perhaps the vacuum cleaner, and would take on prey of any size, bringing home at different times huge rats, a squirrel and a young crow, the last of these still very much alive. And he accomplished memorable feats, such as dragging my daughter's fleecy bathrobe down the stairs to the kitchen, where he tried to stuff it in his dish. Of course he regarded himself as head of the household, as is shown in my painting "The Master", in which he clearly has the upper hand over my son.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8jPoWt_nSDPjX136KoY6ne1R1XtW6Vzj6ApO7bYu_ho1kgRA4FvjMEiO219JAATufUMgnQ2g1BOCr78gFSjWDnLn_NDaV7rGltd5JL4ea7on5ZV97yJoOwUM7sllVuUYThMjITmZ2H62z/s1600/Patrolling+his+Wall+08+24x32.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8jPoWt_nSDPjX136KoY6ne1R1XtW6Vzj6ApO7bYu_ho1kgRA4FvjMEiO219JAATufUMgnQ2g1BOCr78gFSjWDnLn_NDaV7rGltd5JL4ea7on5ZV97yJoOwUM7sllVuUYThMjITmZ2H62z/s320/Patrolling+his+Wall+08+24x32.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Patrolling His Wall -</i> acrylic - 2008 - 24" x 32"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">My first attempt at painting a dog was "Patrolling His Wall". I am always a little disappointed when people say "Aww" as if the dog looks cuddly and sweet. Actually he was all businesslike ferocity, though I hope he did have an affectionate family life when he wasn't working. I can't tell you his name, his breed, or whom he belonged to, or even for certain if he was a male. He was a massive guard dog--look at his heavy collar--and he <b>erupted, </b>high up on the old city wall of Brasov in Romania. My companion and I were having a beer on a cafe terrace at the foot of the wall, when something must have startled him and provoked a volley of deafening barks above our heads. I photographed him from below, but cropped off most of the wall in my painting. In doing so I lost something of the dog's vantage point, but having the focal point perched on top of a virtual mountain just didn't work as a composition. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I think dogs are at their best when they have a job to do, and this dog took his responsibilities very seriously indeed. I hoped to capture his determination to protect his property at all costs--which is why I don't want him to be seen as a softie. As regards the painting, it was difficult and frustrating, in part because of the awkward viewpoint and perspective. I value it chiefly for the foliage in the background, which is painted in a looser and more impressionistic way than I had been able to achieve before.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Soon after making the acquaintance of my future son-in-law, I also met his bearded dragon, a lizard about a foot long who lived in his comic-book store. Simon had had the dragon some ten years by then, which speaks highly of his handling and feeding of it, since many reptiles meet an untimely end in captivity. However, after another year or two it died, and one year I had the idea of painting it for Simon's birthday. I had gathered that the dragon was female and that her name was Trish. I therefore asked Simon to lend me some photos of "Trish," at which point he told me a bit sheepishly that her name was <b>Chish</b>, a contraction, he explained, of "chickenshit."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Although he hunted, Simon was not able to find any photos of his pet, so I had to go further afield to find models. I didn't want to work from someone else's photos, so I drove out to the Reptile Refuge in the further reaches of Surrey, on a dark, rainy afternoon. The Refuge, which I believe has now closed for lack of funding, had a collection of bearded dragons along with many other adopted reptiles, many of which had been abandoned by their owners. I found my way to the dragons' quarters, squeezing past a school group in the narrow space. I asked if I could photograph the lizards, which would have necessitated a flash, and was not surprised when permission was refused. So I stood close to the glass, jostled by the school children, and made some sketches. Later I chose one of them and made Simon's birthday present, but then I used the same pose for two different versions, which became more colourful each time. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU-jSqUXuR6kaQw5Yp7RZVOtySNBCADno8GMP6RQDYACzt6okGvGzcpsbmXlsizqM8v_KXgF_oBdCp8owcVaFM1bIgdzq1pQ4ou0_vT9XMRGQnc9dl1u80opwQkGyq5mBbM5TZkIxN-rDA/s1600/Lizard+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU-jSqUXuR6kaQw5Yp7RZVOtySNBCADno8GMP6RQDYACzt6okGvGzcpsbmXlsizqM8v_KXgF_oBdCp8owcVaFM1bIgdzq1pQ4ou0_vT9XMRGQnc9dl1u80opwQkGyq5mBbM5TZkIxN-rDA/s320/Lizard+2.jpg" width="236" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Lizard 2</i> - acrylic - 14" x 11"</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJqXRXlnMveNHdn_DwLe0W6DzIOT3h0MLRRekRyWZjL7zNKOJJnWnTIIVn-lT_DqVm92sW1nmP48e-sN_kVQlMhhYZzflp3yZE5-boqH8pDz18PMO78OGMtVyCrXoJE1FKsdFUpgr0cEa6/s1600/In+memory+of+Chish.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJqXRXlnMveNHdn_DwLe0W6DzIOT3h0MLRRekRyWZjL7zNKOJJnWnTIIVn-lT_DqVm92sW1nmP48e-sN_kVQlMhhYZzflp3yZE5-boqH8pDz18PMO78OGMtVyCrXoJE1FKsdFUpgr0cEa6/s320/In+memory+of+Chish.jpg" width="316" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>In Memory of Chish</i> - acrylic - 12" x 12"</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCWKfZ1JgRW1remkMwSNefKGlQkmLTClD_2X8t3s8s8HNSBx4PjyH0YoreU_fvvT_tSuCFtabcvw9qYJOchQOOLeFrBuNfJp9CYFswFQbV5toVR4IimJgswXHQrI3ax_Vk6rPKf8qcsUOP/s1600/Lizard+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCWKfZ1JgRW1remkMwSNefKGlQkmLTClD_2X8t3s8s8HNSBx4PjyH0YoreU_fvvT_tSuCFtabcvw9qYJOchQOOLeFrBuNfJp9CYFswFQbV5toVR4IimJgswXHQrI3ax_Vk6rPKf8qcsUOP/s320/Lizard+3.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Lizard 3</i> - acrylic - 12" x 12"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Of the above paintings, I sold "The Master" and "Lizard 3", and Simon seemed happy with his present. Another dog,"Designated Driver", which I featured in my blog on April 23, 2011, also sold, as did my other attempt at reptiles, "Cancun Conversation" (blog March 6, 2011.) So I'm not doing too badly with my animals, and maybe that young boy was on the right track, even if I'm not up there with David Hockney.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span></div><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <i>Next instalment mid-November</i></span></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-17231986669514943262011-09-13T22:55:00.000-07:002011-09-13T22:59:18.745-07:00Reflections: Looking into Water<div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTCyTnhMQ4HIXWO-uOe80wVgvE-i5vwnxvwHoBguxOo6u27dGtjzmFKU5Crp8K1MwMqLbbEYNGklzYgrw5vLq0baHaiiv7NINn-FDA5uc1whri4-9pKwHKqd38gcqWrJ7hcsg-4JA_frKD/s1600/Reed+reflections.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTCyTnhMQ4HIXWO-uOe80wVgvE-i5vwnxvwHoBguxOo6u27dGtjzmFKU5Crp8K1MwMqLbbEYNGklzYgrw5vLq0baHaiiv7NINn-FDA5uc1whri4-9pKwHKqd38gcqWrJ7hcsg-4JA_frKD/s200/Reed+reflections.jpg" width="150" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3ZSlsntMpHzbvM5tfoVOGqSv0zU5I_ruIGnyS2Khbd3jj9C3H79r_2WdMOTUUKwwIYMoprSgkenVhj1RMWdAIf-_aGgftCbmYI2ZwzN4sVMzP2qKPMJYsaDNyKNSBL0UjXrHigooUeWoy/s1600/Reed+abstractions.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3ZSlsntMpHzbvM5tfoVOGqSv0zU5I_ruIGnyS2Khbd3jj9C3H79r_2WdMOTUUKwwIYMoprSgkenVhj1RMWdAIf-_aGgftCbmYI2ZwzN4sVMzP2qKPMJYsaDNyKNSBL0UjXrHigooUeWoy/s200/Reed+abstractions.jpg" width="150" /></a>The first time I thought of reflections in water as a subject for painting in their own right, rather than as an incidental element in a landscape, was in 2006-7, when I painted "Geometry of Reeds." I had taken a couple of photographs at Emma Lake in Saskatchewan (please see my blog post of February 7, 2011, for more details of this trip), but had been surprised by the results: I had intended neither to take such a close-up view of the reeds, nor to take the picture in black and white. I never found out how I had managed to take these photos, but I liked the way each reed and its reflection made an arc, and the way the two halves of the composition were almost, but not entirely, symmetric. In the painting I added non-realistic colours from imagination, but otherwise kept close to my mysterious photographs.</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNXXJkxTHkyqcn9FgR8y0C1YF3TQSUna0zMCNUFQ_iim1xsEVGsoAB31wGsmOxNUNs7tBPQXs9fjAxOMdjIwWjaH5kV18B3A5ttByEb3GymSPjbV_lP2cDe53YhR6gv8EWCeOB6pfq2E6y/s1600/Reeds+with+borders.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNXXJkxTHkyqcn9FgR8y0C1YF3TQSUna0zMCNUFQ_iim1xsEVGsoAB31wGsmOxNUNs7tBPQXs9fjAxOMdjIwWjaH5kV18B3A5ttByEb3GymSPjbV_lP2cDe53YhR6gv8EWCeOB6pfq2E6y/s320/Reeds+with+borders.jpg" width="236" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Geometry of Reeds - acrylic - 40" x 30" - 2006</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> I sold the painting at the Eastside Culture Crawl in 2007. It was the first time that a potential client had seen a painting of mine on the Internet, and had come in specially to find it. The client liked the real thing, and wanted to buy it, but since it was quite large (40" x 30") she felt she needed to go home and measure her wall before committing herself. I agreed to hold the painting until she came back. When she did she was clearly quite upset. While she was talking to me the first time, someone had broken into her car and vandalized the door handle so the door wouldn't close. She had nevertheless gone home, done her measuring, and returned to complete the purchase--leaving an unlockable car in the same parking lot! I felt that her determination and enthusiasm for my work was as big a compliment as the deal itself.<br />
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It wasn't until 2010 that I returned to the study of reflections. I had suggested the subject to the Vancouver Sketch Club as a possible theme for a Club exhibition. My fellow members took up the challenge with enthusiasm, and I produced three small paintings myself, while collecting ideas for larger ones.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2qH8S8unji_L80ujXbltiGToIlBbIflHi2pTwwhHaX_sU_iqS5usmfOXJ5BapZERD3RqUEbieHdGETxLujZm-MloVA37xZXVl4ggDhOY_Jh4pa53FEbMrQ6scFb_uTibNXDcB8T6gmWMY/s1600/Bridge+on+the+Lydd+2010+11x14.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="156" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2qH8S8unji_L80ujXbltiGToIlBbIflHi2pTwwhHaX_sU_iqS5usmfOXJ5BapZERD3RqUEbieHdGETxLujZm-MloVA37xZXVl4ggDhOY_Jh4pa53FEbMrQ6scFb_uTibNXDcB8T6gmWMY/s200/Bridge+on+the+Lydd+2010+11x14.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>Bridge on the Lydd - </i>acrylic - 11" x 14" - 2010 </span></td></tr>
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"Bridge on the Lydd" was painted on site during a painting holiday at Brambles on the borders of Devon and Cornwall in Southwest England. Artist hosts Janet and Peter offer short courses, workshops and art retreats in and around their old converted farm property (to view see <a href="http://www.bramblesartretreat.com/">www.bramblesartretreat.com</a> ) where in June 2010 the glorious summer weather allowed us to paint outdoors every day. Even so, we got a bit chilly working in the partly dried up river bed, and the high spot of the day came when Peter left us for a while to bring us hot Cornish pasties from the nearest pub. <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiseaAG7t5EOV4etjLhQjgaoDPObgq0A0w-eDc-wmUH_59nmO95vmmaZ78KLaFBaTTveyOSGA6MUw0Qg5stCQaReRyB9KQLaS_NfzdC2VyHzf4B-qCTv_I-A_nA_E-mB9OHV60kuPMfh1tQ/s1600/Fishes+in+Circles+8x8+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiseaAG7t5EOV4etjLhQjgaoDPObgq0A0w-eDc-wmUH_59nmO95vmmaZ78KLaFBaTTveyOSGA6MUw0Qg5stCQaReRyB9KQLaS_NfzdC2VyHzf4B-qCTv_I-A_nA_E-mB9OHV60kuPMfh1tQ/s200/Fishes+in+Circles+8x8+2010.jpg" width="196" /></a></td></tr>
<tr style="font-family: inherit;"><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fishes in Circles - </span></i><span style="font-family: inherit;">8" x 8" - 2010</span><i><br />
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</tbody></table> "Fishes in Circles" and "Public Baths" were painted with the Sketch Club show in mind, but more immediately for the Anonymous Show which is mounted each November by North Vancouver Community Arts Council. It's a fund-raising event for the Council, with each painting being priced at $100, of which the artist keeps half in the event of a sale. The paintings all have to be eight inches square, and are displayed anonymously, which is supposed to entice buyers to gamble on acquiring, for a very modest price, something which<b> may</b><b> </b>have been painted by someone famous! Gallery walls covered with the tile-like paintings make for a very attractive display, and this is a painless way to collect original paintings, whether or not they are a sound financial investment. <a href="http://www.nvartscouncil.ca/exhibitions/anonymous-art-show-2010">www.nvartscouncil.ca/exhibitions/anonymous-art-show-2010</a><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdgc7MYgoyK6-zgzkOv-fCfkawfywrmTS3tT2LgkYgLpNra8iBCLb2Je6QAJ7L5vDl_Z1GTDITKGXs4t6TQKB5SNTd_t_SAXE0atEksLaZwuA64Bf70bH436cvWf_Xd8d4iHY0JAnUFYhm/s1600/Public+Baths+8x8+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdgc7MYgoyK6-zgzkOv-fCfkawfywrmTS3tT2LgkYgLpNra8iBCLb2Je6QAJ7L5vDl_Z1GTDITKGXs4t6TQKB5SNTd_t_SAXE0atEksLaZwuA64Bf70bH436cvWf_Xd8d4iHY0JAnUFYhm/s200/Public+Baths+8x8+2010.jpg" width="199" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">Public Baths - </span></i><span style="font-family: inherit;">acrylic - 8" x 8" - 2010</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>The window of my studio space overlooks the roofs of the buildings across the street, and I enjoy watching the birds--mostly seagulls and pigeons--that congregate there, especially when the rain has left big shallow puddles. The pigeons in "Public Baths" reminded me of ladies at a beauty salon as they offered each other preening advice and admired themselves in the mirror. No one snapped up this small painting in the Anonymous Show, but it did sell in the summer at the Sketch Club show at the West End Community Centre.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLBiaXV_YHusPPKoVxrcrPwHos3KMzNhAxMuMqycQ0oA3PUGGWGbTVageKV_2tPnruKCSyZnNEqrKpbO9f67Hd2-IV44qj6XBw8US8jogrLbgfdjTD1kOStAXQ7e-KGs6CpXi3pCUpyvEh/s1600/The+Picnic+20x24+2011.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLBiaXV_YHusPPKoVxrcrPwHos3KMzNhAxMuMqycQ0oA3PUGGWGbTVageKV_2tPnruKCSyZnNEqrKpbO9f67Hd2-IV44qj6XBw8US8jogrLbgfdjTD1kOStAXQ7e-KGs6CpXi3pCUpyvEh/s320/The+Picnic+20x24+2011.jpg" width="263" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Picnic - </span></i><span style="font-family: inherit;">acrylic - 24" x 20" - 2011</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>And so to 2011. One of my first paintings this year was "The Picnic"-- my only attempt so far to paint human beings reflected in water. It's based on a photo taken on one of my trips. I have no idea who the people are, and I don't think they would recognize themselves from this portrayal. Perhaps it's better that way, as I'm not sure they were enjoying their day out very much. As with other paintings of people, I was interested in the body language of the subjects. In this case, there seems to be little connection or communication between the man and his wife, who are each lost in their own thoughts.</div><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Since the spring I</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">have </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">been exclusively concerned with reflections, but from a different angle. I became fascinated with looking down into reflected images, <b>without</b> reference to the objects above the water surface. I am at present completing the tenth in a series called "Watery World", which will have to wait for another time.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/the.vancouver.sketch.club">www.myartclub.com/the.vancouver.sketch.club</a> </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b><i>Next blog post mid-October</i></b> </span></div><br />
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</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-46677190445297945122011-08-12T21:34:00.000-07:002011-08-12T21:34:55.672-07:00Facing Facts: assorted not-quite-portraits<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSIFTQTR4BdT0WD2OTp0Aa6fWpBCfEDACK9l5HXJ3quChZ-Co8ANFU9AV41M7G7RBVI30iLN3iQqgPu6LDwUNTxFHQASp-zkT2CCn_Qt8UmAdcps6sDur0twcNOzEN9rprb159knhyLrza/s1600/On+the+Ferry+08+32x24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSIFTQTR4BdT0WD2OTp0Aa6fWpBCfEDACK9l5HXJ3quChZ-Co8ANFU9AV41M7G7RBVI30iLN3iQqgPu6LDwUNTxFHQASp-zkT2CCn_Qt8UmAdcps6sDur0twcNOzEN9rprb159knhyLrza/s200/On+the+Ferry+08+32x24.jpg" width="148" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">After reading my blog entry on "Travelling Hopefully" back in March, a friend emailed me the following question:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i><b> Do you deliberately avoid faces? It seems to be quite noticeable and has me wondering what the faces are like, and perhaps I don't want to know anyway. It is intriguing.</b></i></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It was an intriguing question for me too. Certainly I had no intention of being coy and deliberately hiding the faces of my subjects . . . but neither had I ever attempted to paint a real <i>portrait</i><b>. </b>What exactly is a portrait, anyway? T<b></b>o me it goes beyond the definition in my Collins dictionary--"a painting, drawing, sculpture, photograph or other likeness of an individual, esp.of the face."<i><b> </b></i>A truly achieved portrait says something about the essence, or soul, of the person, which the artist has perceived and communicated. It's more than skin deep. Oddly, and for no reason I can explain, I feel no particular desire to paint portraits in this sense, and portraits by other artists, even great ones such as Rembrandt, are to me not the most interesting kind of paintings. Since earliest childhood I have been fascinated by faces, and can remember filling notebooks with drawings of them; but I don't think I ever thought of them as real people, even though I had a fanciful belief that if I coloured them they would come alive at night when I was asleep.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG_Dush9Nwlgy3xDRrCMUIFDduXTNwEIvwPs-RsFawCHmsOJCqcM63r0Ola5InjEF84zJYcFfT94TvvCXGu1LMqQYAyda89fIwMT2U3BuYvJENX59gzhB_7IDX1s_o8LPOdPPByIPL1OnC/s1600/Twelve.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="249" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG_Dush9Nwlgy3xDRrCMUIFDduXTNwEIvwPs-RsFawCHmsOJCqcM63r0Ola5InjEF84zJYcFfT94TvvCXGu1LMqQYAyda89fIwMT2U3BuYvJENX59gzhB_7IDX1s_o8LPOdPPByIPL1OnC/s320/Twelve.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Twelve - </i>acrylic (date and dimensions not recorded)</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I have, however, produced a number of paintings featuring <i>people,</i> especially members of my immediate and extended family,<i> </i>and have been surprised on several occasions to find that the resulting image, even if the back was turned or the face partially concealed, was instantly recognizable, and not just by me! An early attempt was "Twelve", which was based on a postage-stamp sized segment of a not-very-good snapshot. The girl had long since grown up, and may very well prefer to disown this version of herself, but even her <i>mother </i>acknowledged the likeness! I was not, however, trying to capture an exact likeness of her face, let alone her soul, but rather to express, as indicated by the title I chose, the truculent negativity that I remember as part and parcel of puberty and early adolescence.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPNAbvg9Dn84E4bl0qvngwDWTTkETT2JpJKLO_CdBZm8l1O-b98ifje9_2UQLoNPwJddF9jasj6EZKdB92Vu8Jj2BJ3Av8vRhwyTGnYtx0IpY7WWK2jtzHUQCGQcb9frRa0smSZ2vaFf2l/s1600/Next+Move.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="253" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiPNAbvg9Dn84E4bl0qvngwDWTTkETT2JpJKLO_CdBZm8l1O-b98ifje9_2UQLoNPwJddF9jasj6EZKdB92Vu8Jj2BJ3Av8vRhwyTGnYtx0IpY7WWK2jtzHUQCGQcb9frRa0smSZ2vaFf2l/s320/Next+Move.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Next Move - </i>acrylic - 14" x 18" - 2005</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMQXXRtWyathTkcJn0uW_5pNhGgYjmc0ub93x39CS6IAbvLgx8TETa0jlZazIlN5AsaKgXU-RcDvzotqAcM6KfR8lojcL3FSc6tuOBe_-0uAbP5YS_zKeUCQW0RCdGARbSrM_Rew4R7Pox/s1600/Two+Cakes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMQXXRtWyathTkcJn0uW_5pNhGgYjmc0ub93x39CS6IAbvLgx8TETa0jlZazIlN5AsaKgXU-RcDvzotqAcM6KfR8lojcL3FSc6tuOBe_-0uAbP5YS_zKeUCQW0RCdGARbSrM_Rew4R7Pox/s320/Two+Cakes.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Two Cakes - </i>acrylic - 24" x 18"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In some paintings of people, it was the direction and intensity of the gaze that interested me. Children are good subjects for this, because of the whole-hearted, whole-body concentration that they bring to tasks. "Next Move" and "Two Cakes" are examples, both based on family photos. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip1-X0fDKG2NMaOQLmzr5XVOrA1EPlTUO386lZG2MduMlVdnYyLNs7moGmjJMdT_cMT4Jom_OMJYlJbI2oUWdSK5YpdcYNH9PEJk6yUris-H9BBYAxVLM3a5mGfbPMcCmblZUsgIit3skN/s1600/Bike+Lesson.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip1-X0fDKG2NMaOQLmzr5XVOrA1EPlTUO386lZG2MduMlVdnYyLNs7moGmjJMdT_cMT4Jom_OMJYlJbI2oUWdSK5YpdcYNH9PEJk6yUris-H9BBYAxVLM3a5mGfbPMcCmblZUsgIit3skN/s320/Bike+Lesson.jpg" width="251" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Bike Lesson - </i>acrylic - 30" x 14"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In the case of "Bike Lesson" it was the body language that appealed to me. The little boy, both proud and precarious, is on the brink of taking off on his wheels. He is well protected, with his helmet and knee pads, but still needs the caring touch of his father, soon to be left behind as the older generation always is.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"On the Ferry" (see above) combines the intent gaze with the directional body language, so that the four men seem to be racing ahead of the ship towards their destination.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-OO2amyVScJoVQhxwHDpMpMyPjZ2GlyN7C8vVsgitD84C6BpKNo7SI_9bN51GeUOo8MoANiQeKhbOLZshBe7JWEeMraLscvmZYY0TMXXm933TMwvy2HNJIjwr5tKw2JTjDsvoGEOLvZ_8/s1600/Shore+Line.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-OO2amyVScJoVQhxwHDpMpMyPjZ2GlyN7C8vVsgitD84C6BpKNo7SI_9bN51GeUOo8MoANiQeKhbOLZshBe7JWEeMraLscvmZYY0TMXXm933TMwvy2HNJIjwr5tKw2JTjDsvoGEOLvZ_8/s320/Shore+Line.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Shore Line </i>- acrylic - 16" x 14" - 2008</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"Shore Line" is another painting of back views. This time, the gaze is implied in the huddled body language of the old ladies, who seem to be shifting and fidgeting as they share confidences about what they see. I imagined them as poised on the brink of their end-of-life voyage that is not far off; but the purchaser of the painting put a more cheerful spin on it: she saw it as a depiction of herself and her friends a decade or two in the future, enjoying companionship and a day on the beach.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy1qUMIMWRZbrJc1tCF3tunebq37v7b-iVGrH0YvM2GFLszidVyA9VgVS0qZhQoRx_kjCWg8LmhPuCRvNrIyxKlN5C7R7pnglZBqgOMvI5pwQwyxxDBfzAKabAGUKqJm31XnY9DoqY5iGq/s1600/Snooze+30x24+2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy1qUMIMWRZbrJc1tCF3tunebq37v7b-iVGrH0YvM2GFLszidVyA9VgVS0qZhQoRx_kjCWg8LmhPuCRvNrIyxKlN5C7R7pnglZBqgOMvI5pwQwyxxDBfzAKabAGUKqJm31XnY9DoqY5iGq/s320/Snooze+30x24+2010.jpg" width="252" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Snooze -</i> acrylic - 30" x 24" - 2010 </td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Finally, two recent paintings of family members show quite a lot of face, and are certainly recognizable, but again my intention was not really to paint their portraits. I have always enjoyed watching babies and small children sleep, because they work at it with the concentration that it deserves, given its extreme importance. (Adults, in contrast, tend to regard it as a necessary waste of time, a sort of void between periods of real life.) The little boy asleep in the car is patently recharging his batteries ready for another bout of three-year-old boisterousness. His cap and work shirt amused me, too: he might have just come off shift on a building site!</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9_6pMP7el5_bASKPJxqivpujcBtCWFOo3znAwwDfWMj2uhSiwF3wtr2jGukqEAleoDegTldyrbedfGlR40cIL-da1m3FF9aaZlkZoda7XdPbpFuK8fq_SkhYuXG0MTFEocpOQgpBjTD6W/s1600/Seaside+Pub+16x24+2011.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9_6pMP7el5_bASKPJxqivpujcBtCWFOo3znAwwDfWMj2uhSiwF3wtr2jGukqEAleoDegTldyrbedfGlR40cIL-da1m3FF9aaZlkZoda7XdPbpFuK8fq_SkhYuXG0MTFEocpOQgpBjTD6W/s320/Seaside+Pub+16x24+2011.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Seaside Pub - </i>acrylic - 16" x 24" - 2011</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"Seaside Pub" shows an elderly, long-married couple sharing a special moment. Again, the gaze and body-language are the important items. I painted the picture for an exhibition on the subject of love--in this case the love of two people who have grown closer over the years and can still enjoy a private joke or intimate confidence.The exhibition jury declined my painting, but I'm still glad I did it. It's a statement of optimism about what a relationship can be.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.MyArtClub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b><i>Next instalment mid-September</i></b> </span></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-30692124382851145312011-07-11T21:52:00.000-07:002011-07-11T21:52:50.561-07:00Looking Through: "Lunchtime in Paris"<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhS7KnmR3GmkzzxStpGXuXj9EdZKvR-Sy8Tp1FZWJUvaiGLQk1CjabJSwsul4za65ZRTQ4POM5B0nx4eu2x4zeR2ks6eV-qu8tUAUX3QNQB8exHBNUKYBzprNkX8vzlvtaJsCBgik9VpGBa/s320/Lunchtime+in+Paris+18x24+2010.jpg" width="320" /><span id="goog_1945806595"></span><span id="goog_1945806596"></span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/"></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Lunchtime in Paris - </i>acrylic - 18" x 24" - 2010 </td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This painting is based on a photograph that I took in the cafeteria of the Musee D'Orsay in Paris, where I happened to be having lunch right at noon.</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It's another "Looking in/Looking out" painting (for other examples, please see earlier instalments of this blog), but this time the outside view is glimpsed through an immense clock which dates back to the days when the building was a railway station. The clock in my painting is reversed, like a mirror image, because its front was on the outside of the building and would have provided the time of day to passengers approaching the station. It faces the Seine, with the Tuileries Gardens in the distance.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I was in Paris for a week, in June of 2009, with the same friend who accompanied me to Cancun (see blog post on "On the Ferry", March 6, 2011.) This trip was not, alas, a free one, but it was a very good deal--airfare from Vancouver, bed and breakfast for a week, transfers and taxes, a boat ride on the Seine, and a half-bottle of champagne, all for $1300 each. Since I had not had the opportunity to do any cultural sightseeing in Paris's since 1967, when I was whisked into the Louvre to see the Mona Lisa, which blew me away, and the Nike of Samothrace, which didn't, my main objective was to spend as much time as possible in the art galleries. We visited the Orangerie, the Louvre, and the Picasso and Dali museums, but enjoyed our day in the Musee D'Orsay the most. (As a retired language teacher I feel embarrassed at not putting the acute accent on "musee," but don't know how to do it.) We also fitted in a day at Versailles, and always made sure we left time for strolling, sitting, just generally hanging out, and of course, eating!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Back in my studio in Vancouver I started painting the scene on a 20" x 24" canvas. It was one of the most difficult challenges that I have set myself. The massive iron framework that supports the clock itself is seen from a slight angle, and is nearer to the viewer than the clock face, so that the various circles are not quite round, and not quite concentric. The spokes and segments of the circle needed to look as if they were equal, but they weren't quite, because of the oblique angle. And painting those Roman numerals backwards proved to be extraordinarily difficult, though I still can't quite understand why. At the point where I was beginning to despair of ever getting the perspective acceptable it occurred to me to check the corners of the canvas stretcher, and sure enough, they weren't right angles and the sides were slightly askew. No wonder I was having so much trouble! I took the canvas off the stretcher, which I took back to the store for a refund. Then I restretched the canvas on a slightly smaller frame--18" x 24"--which worked a lot better. Even so, the painting was a struggle from beginning to end. I have to hope it was a useful learning experience, because the irony is that the paintings that are most laborious to produce rarely turn out as well as the ones that seem to paint themselves. I think part of the problem with "Lunchtime in Paris" was that I had fallen into the trap of being enslaved by my photo, and feeling that the composition had to be literally and mathematically accurate. Since completing this painting I have tried to be less literal, and to let myself play around more with the composition. It's certainly more fun that way!</span><br />
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<i><b><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Art Practice News:</span></b></i><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This post is a bit later than intended because I was away in England for 3 weeks, and just returned. </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">While I was there, in addition to visiting family and friends, I took a wonderful short course called "Adventurous Drawing" at West Dean College in Sussex. Please see <a href="http://www.westdean.org.uk/">www.westdean.org.uk</a></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> for pictures of this amazing place and information about their courses and activities. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I've been updating my website to include more recent work. Please check it out at <a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Designated Driver</i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">My painting "<b>Designated Driver</b>", featured in my blog on April 23, was recently sold!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I have four paintings on display until mid-August at the West End Community Centre, 870 Denman St., Vancouver, as part of the Vancouver Sketch Club's show on the theme "Reflections."</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkrJ13WO5fVtqtNsXyQ1nGpRXWP9OWAcK513lrXx5C8vba9SIwNnBF5-y5WrSDcM731Udhsd1NkZmZDIPbaKhnP8gqLK8bwF16SF1wJJLknerTvB4esShushWw4c7anOrUJ_kocBBg3-J_/s1600/Bridge+on+the+Lydd+2010+11x14.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="156" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkrJ13WO5fVtqtNsXyQ1nGpRXWP9OWAcK513lrXx5C8vba9SIwNnBF5-y5WrSDcM731Udhsd1NkZmZDIPbaKhnP8gqLK8bwF16SF1wJJLknerTvB4esShushWw4c7anOrUJ_kocBBg3-J_/s200/Bridge+on+the+Lydd+2010+11x14.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bridge on the Lydd - </i>acrylic - 11" x 14" - 2010</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bathtub Voyeur</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">My little painting "Bathtub Voyeur" (Blog March 20) is back from Brazil, and on display until July 24 at the Ferry Building, 1414 Argyle, West Vancouver, with the Mini-Art Exchange exhibition of "Faces." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">And finally,a few examples of the photos I took in April on my trip to Death Valley and other arid bits of the USA. Eventually I hope to do a series of paintings of sand dunes, but first I have to get the opposite--reflections in water--out of my system!</span><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: center;"> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i><b>Next instalment Mid-August</b></i></span></div><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiphKNy8vPMKerrI27hUYDDEk8NS0jw0UaJsGpMan93bBDhALklb7bqNne6mTWXENdIWB4GAFTIUzYeDDOEuVzX-vVv2P4WLzXhIeTVOs0NSbljoteCke9VCLtynFt6WBvyS7zJ4HoUky1j/s1600/4+Dunes+8.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-90862515740953084612011-06-05T22:40:00.000-07:002011-06-05T22:40:06.026-07:00Inside/Outside in France: "Country Church"<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Since 2009 one of my recurring interests has been painting scenes viewed through a door or window. Examples that have featured in my blog include "The Open Door" (Feb. 14), "Hanging in the Rain" (March 13), "Designated Driver" (April 23), and, most recently, "Through a Curtain" (May 2)."Painting the Porch" and "Buying Postcards" are further examples of paintings that include an inside and an outside view.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYciMccPk9opSDQ8SP6Z878NLcohmQT-rI-YBqkHux36-JGJAfnyT5syiQ-PKLTEn-DUH6o6ztXMzzVC7PwENhujYzoxaesmTmpUZhcqK6V7QROzczhdgPH0TVUQ_eaUJl2eOu3h12Jleb/s1600/Country+Church--Painting+the+Porch+14x11+09.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYciMccPk9opSDQ8SP6Z878NLcohmQT-rI-YBqkHux36-JGJAfnyT5syiQ-PKLTEn-DUH6o6ztXMzzVC7PwENhujYzoxaesmTmpUZhcqK6V7QROzczhdgPH0TVUQ_eaUJl2eOu3h12Jleb/s320/Country+Church--Painting+the+Porch+14x11+09.jpg" width="250" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Painting the Porch - acrylic - 14 " x 11 " </i></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJuBwMzQwDpP-sWfHT3jv1ChsaeLer70kNrswpGtUfDmGNDcyHuTpPQTp7RY9VV-OfECOAIx0LdePZMB4asOGLnlcTDJ3uiAaU37wJxtLcAtmHvdPoMfCibaQJT5Uvuwmts9UsDzYXYL8g/s1600/Country+Church--Buying+Postcards+14x11+09.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJuBwMzQwDpP-sWfHT3jv1ChsaeLer70kNrswpGtUfDmGNDcyHuTpPQTp7RY9VV-OfECOAIx0LdePZMB4asOGLnlcTDJ3uiAaU37wJxtLcAtmHvdPoMfCibaQJT5Uvuwmts9UsDzYXYL8g/s320/Country+Church--Buying+Postcards+14x11+09.jpg" width="251" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Buying Postcards - acrylic - 14 " x 11 "</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The two paintings are based on a single photograph that I took inside the village church of Montaigut-le-Blanc in 2001. The photograph shows all three female figures --the woman selling postcards, the woman buying the cards, and the woman sitting outside painting. In my initial sketches I included all three in my composition, but I couldn't make it work. The figures seemed to get in each other's way and provide no clear focus for the viewer's eye. So I tried separating them, while still keeping the church interior almost identical in each panel. I found that it worked better to make the wall and rock garden look larger and nearer for the "Painting" panel, so as to frame the artist in a setting. In the "Postcards" panel, on the other hand, the scenery outside is just incidental background: all the action is inside the church.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I was in Montaigut for my first painting holiday, an eagerly anticipated event for which I'd been saving. I arrived with high energy and enthusiasm, inspired by a show of Morandi's still life paintings that I had just seen at the Tate in London. In one important respect the trip was disappointing: since the program was advertised as a "workshop" I had expected a fairly structured format, with assignments, supervised work, and critiques. This never materialized. The only instruction was a painting demonstration each day, and for the rest of the time we students were left to ourselves. Since then I have participated in several painting holidays, in England, France and Canada, and have found in each case that, without being slave drivers, the instructors have kept their charges busy and given lots of direction and feed-back, so I know now that my expectations were not unreasonable.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Determined to draw and paint anyway, since that was what we were there for, my friend and travelling companion (who is the woman painting the church porch) went off each day to find a good spot to sit and sketch. There was a wealth of subject matter only steps away, a choice of flowers, gardens, buildings, street scenes and rural landscape. Montaigut is built on a very steep hill, and all the streets are zigzags, with narrow terraces between them. At every turn there is a look-out point over the surrounding country. The park-like churchyard, with its shade trees, clumps of dahlias, warm stone walls, and Romanesque church, became a favourite sketching place.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The village is situated in the central part of France, in Auvergne. The terrain is some of the most turbulent and tormented that I have ever seen, a succession of dramatic ridges and gorges, with the occasional eroded and extinct volcano. Shortly before the end of my stay there I was able to get an aerial view of this landscape. It was my birthday--a rather special one--and I decided to treat myself to a ride in the hot air balloon that sailed by every morning and evening, its timing determined by the need for the right kind and strength of air currents. I had to leave dinner a little early, before dessert was served, which caused me a touch of regret, since the desserts were always delectable. The balloon basket held two other passengers besides myself, and the pilot. I loved the sensation of flying in near-silence, one minute soaring to dizzying heights, the next skimming the trees and hillsides. We flew until it was almost dark, our flight extended longer than expected because we were waiting for the right current to flip us across a highway. We needed a level bit of field where we could land, and where the balloon operators' van could come and pick us up. After we were safely down and the balloon was deflated and folded, the van driver produced a hamper from which the postponed dessert appeared, decorated with sparklers! The assembled company sang "Happy birthday" to me, completing a truly magical evening.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">As well as sketching and painting in and around the village, I took photographs, and in 2009 dug out the one of the church. I painted the two versions on wood panels, each 14 " x 11 ". It was only after completing them that I discovered that if I placed them side by side as a diptych, they seemed to complement each other and make a single work. Now I would not want to separate them: I think they look best hung an inch or so apart.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiasHF2e54eBWJNoX0k0IFfeROJQROZ8zzc9FOoiDE3jOfp_KUPVv-xYh986ZbKl2dCFuz2SYm3-Nx48R1QtS_qJt_TR97zJWNr78h-8XLEKJ-bHVQNGdJcDrBbCvV75StXijMLV0LI0l7/s1600/Country+Church--Diptych.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="191" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiasHF2e54eBWJNoX0k0IFfeROJQROZ8zzc9FOoiDE3jOfp_KUPVv-xYh986ZbKl2dCFuz2SYm3-Nx48R1QtS_qJt_TR97zJWNr78h-8XLEKJ-bHVQNGdJcDrBbCvV75StXijMLV0LI0l7/s320/Country+Church--Diptych.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Country Church (diptych)</i></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
<a href="http://www.twitter.com/EaselChirps">www.twitter.com/EaselChirps</a> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-62127111585890908212011-05-02T16:41:00.000-07:002011-05-02T16:41:57.601-07:00Dealing with Ambiguity: "Through a Curtain"<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA8Q2rXig3VMGWWsYGFnMSXTH9lsmBQFxoP80I0q9HYmtREjoTgcCqZNsjzxGWgGpV0Oo_KuGdqXuFd4ThnEWglz4v1iaPVuENgGuB9Hy_Tnb74Snsa9tv5jxbAcpYtAHcB5peFD77LTJk/s1600/Through+a+Curtain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA8Q2rXig3VMGWWsYGFnMSXTH9lsmBQFxoP80I0q9HYmtREjoTgcCqZNsjzxGWgGpV0Oo_KuGdqXuFd4ThnEWglz4v1iaPVuENgGuB9Hy_Tnb74Snsa9tv5jxbAcpYtAHcB5peFD77LTJk/s400/Through+a+Curtain.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Through a Curtain --</i>original version</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Last time I ended with a </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">riddle: spot the difference between two images of the painting "Through a Curtain" and see if you can guess why I changed it. This was a tough question to answer considering the quality of my images. Having just spent a week in the company of some real experts in photography and digital manipulation, I'm especially conscious of my shortcomings, and more determined to improve, but for now will have to make do with the images I have, with their misleading faults. Some of the minor differences between the before-and-after images of "Through a Curtain" have nothing to do with the painting and are just indications of my photographic deficiencies. For example, I didn't change the stripes at the sides--the frame of the sliding door. The way they curve and change width is simply a result of photographing a tall, narrow canvas without knowing how to correct the resulting distortion. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEcGokqLXUYCT57OOM1cVFGEVPh7zl94__Dlmd1psEkd-t44-ke1T4-NztTiU90uGG4VTWkLUNCLGysXMCEiIE5ZwCWIgmzlRPcnJuIALa-FcZ3aDP_FcIGugsJbkE5xMaQZw4FqC_gNx2/s1600/Through+a+Curtain+revised.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEcGokqLXUYCT57OOM1cVFGEVPh7zl94__Dlmd1psEkd-t44-ke1T4-NztTiU90uGG4VTWkLUNCLGysXMCEiIE5ZwCWIgmzlRPcnJuIALa-FcZ3aDP_FcIGugsJbkE5xMaQZw4FqC_gNx2/s400/Through+a+Curtain+revised.jpg" width="248" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Through a Curtain -</i> acrylic - 2011 - 36" x 22"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In spite </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">of the difficulties, one reader took on the challenge, and was on the right track when she wrote: "The back of the chair was making too solid a barrier in the 'first' version. You've lightened it up and this allows the viewer to go past the chair. Also for some reason it becomes easier to actually see the person in the chair." There was in fact a problem with the figure in the chair, who could be seen in two different ways. This ambiguity placed my painting in the company of trick images, which usually depend on how the positive and negative space are perceived, and of those unfortunate snapshots we've all seen where a tree sprouts out of someone's head. For some glaring--though possibly contrived rather than accidental--examples of this, go to <a href="http://ronilai.blogspot.com/2011/04/perfect-angles.html">http://ronilai.blogspot.com/2011/04/perfect-angles.html</a> You'll see that the problem (or the joke) usually arises when the photographer doesn't allow for things being in different planes, so that it isn't clear what is in front and what behind. This kind of problem occurs much less frequently in painting than in photography because painting is a slow-moving medium with lots of time to think and make adjustments, but as I've discovered, some mistakes slip through undetected.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The woman in "Through a Curtain" is the same friend who appeared, in a very similar pose, in "Foreign Hotel" (Easel Talk, Feb. 14, 2011.) The more recent painting is based on a photo I took during our 2010 trip to Sicily. My friend was sitting on the balcony of our hotel in Taormina. I liked the contrast between the straight lines of the door frame and the curves of the railing and the organic shapes of the vegetation outside. I also thought it would be an interesting challenge to paint a scene and figure veiled by a nylon curtain. The curtain, in fact, seemed to be the main player in this little drama, and determined the title.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The painting was completed, or so I thought, early this year, and was on my living-room wall when my travelling companion came to visit. To my surprise she did not at first recognize either the setting or herself. When I gave her a hint, she stared at the painting for some time and then asked in bewilderment, "But why did you paint me with a beard?"</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I was as mystified as she was, but eventually realized that what she what she was seeing was something like this:</span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqAoI5OiZf8PRiamcsz1sMPmglI1cnr2AOzF3Qip2NfzDdRHD5AygrYMw5GQN-3gGMm9H-NLhn4Fyj-4jTdB6SSqLmXjUot2x4OigfTXBhcyQn0YmBCJiwgznd3YTWZ4iYMgBmD9gBlju5/s1600/Through+a+Curtain+CM%2527s+view+with+cut.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqAoI5OiZf8PRiamcsz1sMPmglI1cnr2AOzF3Qip2NfzDdRHD5AygrYMw5GQN-3gGMm9H-NLhn4Fyj-4jTdB6SSqLmXjUot2x4OigfTXBhcyQn0YmBCJiwgznd3YTWZ4iYMgBmD9gBlju5/s320/Through+a+Curtain+CM%2527s+view+with+cut.jpg" width="265" /></a></div><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> whereas what I intended was more like this:</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3pMPMqQXzzTN3ai7ZKcsBvJ99bmZd6ZPGVA0Nr9WpjNM4hOcotroeg5IJcZstE9IWFeTjpqi3eigs0zKq9f_dqZzjGnqmIUu4JCama0nFn3pxkGc5Z25Up2VtTmb-uysGR4PVIGTXa6FW/s1600/Through+a+Curtain+cut+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3pMPMqQXzzTN3ai7ZKcsBvJ99bmZd6ZPGVA0Nr9WpjNM4hOcotroeg5IJcZstE9IWFeTjpqi3eigs0zKq9f_dqZzjGnqmIUu4JCama0nFn3pxkGc5Z25Up2VtTmb-uysGR4PVIGTXa6FW/s320/Through+a+Curtain+cut+2.jpg" width="258" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For me</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> it remained hard to see the bearded lady (who also seems to have a black face but a white arm) without squinting and contorting myself, but obviously I had to take the painting back to the studio and try to eliminate the ambiguity. I modified the outline of the dark foliage that seemed to be causing the confusion. Then I had to fiddle with the folds of the curtain and touch up other parts of the scene. My friend hasn't yet seen the revised version, but I hope when she does she'll recognize her beardless self!</span><br />
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<div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood%20">www.MyArtClub.com/judith.fairwood </a><br />
<a href="http://www.twitter.com/EaselChirps%20">www.twitter.com/EaselChirps </a> </div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.easelchirps.blogspot.com/" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
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</div><div style="text-align: left;"><i><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Please note: </span></i><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">from now on I will be adding posts to this blog about once a month. Look out for the next instalment in early June. I'll email the people on my "Notify" list--let me know if you'd like your name added--and will</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">also announce it at <a href="http://www.twitter.com/EaselChirps%20">www.twitter.com/EaselChirps.</a> Meanwhile, if you're in the Vancouver area and would like to see the real thing, please come and see paintings at the annual art fair Art in the City this weekend (May 6 - 8) at the West End Community Centre. I'll be sharing a booth with Suzan Marczak (<a href="http://www.suzanmarczak.yolasite.com/">www.suzanmarczak.yolasite.com</a> ) who will be showing ceramic sculpture. Hours and address at <a href="http://www.westendcc.ca/">www.westendcc.ca</a> . Admission free! </span></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-70618122150635986012011-04-23T10:09:00.000-07:002011-04-23T10:09:41.888-07:00Serious Humour: Designated Driver<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiujw2f3nBItlQ31-dtIcAo2wvNh77u2IIlBrfGpGAhVcRofurZgnwmYJ4rxVTByFebymyhpC2C0FIEGWiVufIaq4_-B8DAHrpFvlioauyjH2GZU5QD4JNha2yCndpF4e1EOQw14CoPg1Wb/s1600/The+Designated+Driver+2010+22x22.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiujw2f3nBItlQ31-dtIcAo2wvNh77u2IIlBrfGpGAhVcRofurZgnwmYJ4rxVTByFebymyhpC2C0FIEGWiVufIaq4_-B8DAHrpFvlioauyjH2GZU5QD4JNha2yCndpF4e1EOQw14CoPg1Wb/s320/The+Designated+Driver+2010+22x22.jpg" width="317" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Designated Driver</i> - acrylic - 22" x 22" - 2010 </td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">When I spotted the bulldog behind the wheel of the red pick-up I burst out laughing. I was returning to my car in the parking lot of a neighbourhood supermarket. I grabbed my camera from the car and hurried back to the pick-up, hoping that the dog wouldn't move and that its owner wouldn't return before I'd snapped a couple of photos.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">A dog in the front seat of a vehicle is a common enough sight, but this was unusual because of the dog's size. It looked as large as a human driver, and was taking its responsibilities so seriously that the title "Designated Driver" suggested itself to me right away. If the boss had come back to his truck the worse for wear, the dog looked perfectly capable of driving home safely.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Sometimes what I think will be the hardest part of a painting turns out to be easy, and vice versa. I assumed that painting the dog's portrait would be extremely challenging, but in fact it came together without much effort. The vehicles, on the other hand, were horribly difficult to get right, especially the vents of the pick-up's radiator grille. I often seem to struggle with perspective issues. Some artists seem to manage perfectly well with wonky lines and tipsy buildings. Others go to extremes of mathematical plotting to ensure accuracy. Personally I don't much care whether it's exactly "right", but in a painting that's otherwise realistic it seems to me that the scene should look convincing and the buildings stand solidly on their foundations. I don't even like those new-fangled <b>real</b> sky-scrapers that twist and lurch and project outwards: they make me feel a bit seasick. So I work away at the perspective in my paintings until things feel stable and grounded.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">When working on a painting I inevitably spend a lot of time thinking about my subject. In the case of "Designated Driver" I put myself in the place of the bulldog, and soon I didn't find its situation so funny. Dogs are animals that live to a great extent ruled by the instincts of the wolves from which they are descended. What must it feel like to be left all alone in a completely artificial and inorganic capsule in the barren wastes of a car park? Does the dog regard the vehicle as a sort of extension of the pack's den, which it is obliged to defend on behalf of its human boss? What can it be thinking about as it sits there waiting, surrounded by the incomprehensible nonsense of human strangers coming and going, entering and leaving their metal boxes, creating ghastly noises and fumes as they drive away? With questions like these running through my mind, my amusement at my subject gave way to sympathy and admiration for the dog's patience and tolerance. Living in our mechanized urban world is frustrating enough at times for us humans who invented it. How must it feel to have to live in it without having a clue <b>why </b>it's the way it is, or what's the point of it all?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">One thing I really enjoy about showing my work is that sometimes it reminds people of stories or experiences that they share with me. I heard several dog-in-car stories at the 2010 Eastside Culture Crawl, but my favourite was one about a big, fierce-looking dog whose owner didn't bother to take the keys out of the ignition or lock the car, confident that no one would try to break into such a well guarded vehicle. No one did . . . but on more than one occasion the owner got locked <b>out, </b>by his dog! Presumably the dog heaved himself around in the seat and pressed down the lever that locked the car from the inside. Or did he perhaps have a mischievous sense of humour?</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.MyArtClub.com/judith.fairwood</a> </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.twitter.com/EaselChirps" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.twitter.com/EaselChirps</a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-style: italic;">Next time (around May 1): </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b>Spot the Difference: "Through a Curtain" as it was and as it is </b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi89B9Z2tcA1O2j9DIEhwjMoq-S0JmQDMz7BX0RgX36ny7_9pEftTKZ2tOJcdDdea3C3Pnbf9pd2X4r1-3j8d46ZhNIpyEboENEqe_Lbd_axAtzwA5JNp5rxaQfksMgeVwrL-xV3bpjYjFb/s1600/Through+a+Curtain+revised.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi89B9Z2tcA1O2j9DIEhwjMoq-S0JmQDMz7BX0RgX36ny7_9pEftTKZ2tOJcdDdea3C3Pnbf9pd2X4r1-3j8d46ZhNIpyEboENEqe_Lbd_axAtzwA5JNp5rxaQfksMgeVwrL-xV3bpjYjFb/s320/Through+a+Curtain+revised.jpg" width="199" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Through a Curtain - </i>refinished </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyrF_eZk6u1PmUp3tN4_95o7y62rDmlBhCS-s8dZ_r2fdnoh1qeWG9uJ6qmVh7wP_W9O8wV06vONfVw-gZMl6eil1ERjyJQJnpdzLDB8btuxFbyYdDW-SUs2zbX6ofoXzly5oq21NmweOy/s1600/Through+a+Curtain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyrF_eZk6u1PmUp3tN4_95o7y62rDmlBhCS-s8dZ_r2fdnoh1qeWG9uJ6qmVh7wP_W9O8wV06vONfVw-gZMl6eil1ERjyJQJnpdzLDB8btuxFbyYdDW-SUs2zbX6ofoXzly5oq21NmweOy/s320/Through+a+Curtain.jpg" width="192" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Through a Curtain </i>- as first painted</td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">If you can figure out why I changed it</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">you have very sharp eyes</span> . . . <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">or maybe a strange way of seeing things!</span></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-16232124271327776822011-04-17T21:42:00.000-07:002011-04-17T21:42:33.732-07:00Spotlight on Gastropods: "Van Huysum's Snails"<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0ElMePZE6EfbqYroz4uKAH9Jc0xg7vpEbHBvqKe7ZU3apM44ChcfPjR2j2SbY5IxO8BRZzIKKOYhE9fpTGNLjyzkOxUqGFJD4IgM88Md9smG6Ayy4pWYk5CjJa7TGOWgFMoGp1_aM6yK5/s1600/Van+Huysum%2527s+Snail+I.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0ElMePZE6EfbqYroz4uKAH9Jc0xg7vpEbHBvqKe7ZU3apM44ChcfPjR2j2SbY5IxO8BRZzIKKOYhE9fpTGNLjyzkOxUqGFJD4IgM88Md9smG6Ayy4pWYk5CjJa7TGOWgFMoGp1_aM6yK5/s320/Van+Huysum%2527s+Snail+I.jpg" width="256" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Van Huysum's Snail I -</i> acrylic - 2007 - 16" x 20"</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiw1_RqlWQu1kIwDYiVrWUgSxAl2BJy3z8iPyQrcR4hNFYtaj9ZelrgFczuiiIm50YGEgGHtr0AW3u47SQF03ZueYXFIIK6LU9lwoHf8QnRA3TQ1le_k761qYXW-w1vI-mcabr-nltXETBD/s1600/Van+Huysum%2527s+Snail+II.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiw1_RqlWQu1kIwDYiVrWUgSxAl2BJy3z8iPyQrcR4hNFYtaj9ZelrgFczuiiIm50YGEgGHtr0AW3u47SQF03ZueYXFIIK6LU9lwoHf8QnRA3TQ1le_k761qYXW-w1vI-mcabr-nltXETBD/s320/Van+Huysum%2527s+Snail+II.jpg" width="258" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Van Huysum's Snail II - </i>acrylic - 2007 - 16" x 20"</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I have always been a fan of still life painting, and some of my favourite artists are practitioners of the genre--Cezanne's apples, Morandi's dusty old bottles, Jim Dine's tools, and Wayne Thiebaud's cakes come immediately to mind. But I had never been very excited by the big floral arrangements painted by some of the famous Dutch painters until I learned to look for the creepy-crawlies that lurk in the corners and chomp their way through the leaves.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Dutch realism was a Calvinist reaction against the religious iconography of pre-Reformation art and its continuation in the Catholic countries during the Counter-Reformation. The Dutch painters depicted the real people, places and objects of their world, not saints, angels and cherubs swirling around the heavens. Nevertheless, theology is still implicit in their 17th century art, even in a painting of a vase of flowers. At first glance the viewer sees something beautiful--a floral arrangement at the peak of perfection--but needs to be reminded that in this material world everything passes, fades and dies, and only the spiritual world endures. Apparent perfection is mere vanity, unreliable and transitory, subject to being destroyed or consumed. Some painters included elements such as clocks and skulls to jolt the viewer back to reality. Others were more subtle: they implied the passing of time and the vanity of this world by slipping flies and beetles into their compositions, along with bits of dead leaf and fallen petals.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCBC1tqQM3ZqPtBNtyD0z1u_xcBiJLZZ-yaTtActXJY0g62mpaSq_CFydAXzZjXLHUkjN9g_CmlMbLkV-2K5X-nqnfAVNdN-Qkp275qT6-8r7y_KzVNzNdASjivS_BUZp5vkqeI2fO3cW5/s1600/Hollhocks+snails.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCBC1tqQM3ZqPtBNtyD0z1u_xcBiJLZZ-yaTtActXJY0g62mpaSq_CFydAXzZjXLHUkjN9g_CmlMbLkV-2K5X-nqnfAVNdN-Qkp275qT6-8r7y_KzVNzNdASjivS_BUZp5vkqeI2fO3cW5/s320/Hollhocks+snails.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Detail of <i>Hollyhocks </i>etc. painting by Jan van Huysum </td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Jan van Huysum lived from1682 to1749, so by the time he painted his floral compositions he probably included his animal elements more for decorative than moral purposes, but he still followed the convention of his predecessors. Leafing through one of my art books one day I paused to have a closer look at a painting by van Huysum called "Hollyhocks and Other Flowers in a Vase." </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Towards the bottom of the </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">composition, as a sort of visual footnote, there are two snails, a small one crawling up a hollyhock leaf, and a larger, very perky one, advancing purposefully along the shelf.</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The idea came to me of</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">blowing up two small sections of van Huysum's painting</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> and placing each snail centre-stage.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">When an original painting has been photographed and reproduced in print there's no way of telling how accurate the colour is. I may have seen the Hollyhocks painting in the National Gallery at some time, but if so I don't really remember it.</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Judging by an Internet image I found recently: <a href="http://www.artunframed.com/images/artmis15/huysum88.jpg">www.artunframed.com/images/artmis15/huysum88.jpg</a> the colours are more vibrant than the ones in my book.</span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">For my purposes it didn't matter; I just stayed as close as I could to the book illustration. (<i>Dutch Painting </i>by Christopher Brown, Phaidon, 1993, p. 125.)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Singling out the snails to star in the show is another way of honouring the humble and easily overlooked, a theme that recurs in my work. To a gardener slugs and snails are the animal equivalent of nasty weeds--things that need to be eliminated because they threaten the more desirable plants. But any true depiction of nature acknowledges that everything has its season and eventually dies, and that every living thing has to eat at the expense of something else. Flowers, especially cut ones, may be seen as a metaphor for human youth and beauty, and the snails as a symbol of time, which relentlessly gnaws away at our lifespan. Snails are also often seen as the epitome of ugliness, as expressed in the disparaging nursery rhyme:</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Slugs and snails and puppy dogs' tails,</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>That's what little boys are made of.</i></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i> </i>Yet a snail's shell is a beautiful object, no less so than the mollusc shells that children of all ages like to pick up on the beach. It seems to me that van Huysum loved his snails. His treatment of the larger one in "Hollyhocks," with its eyes and antennae tips highlighted, shows a marked degree of respect for the despised creature. So perhaps he would understand why someone painting 400 years later might want to present a close-up view of the hungry little crawlers.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.MyArtClub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.twitter.com/EaselChirps">www.twitter.com/EaselChirps</a></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>Next time (around April 24</i>): <b>Serious Humour: "Designated Driver"</b></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2YNyFIE695XKUdI4pkQNPXJJ3jldMEgcDc1bwqNvd1PR3_wM_3cHqBX4UxZHX8MZorgUTAXSKr8r1gEn_XNiOypu12M1nGMWsNriknSueUCjOzlAkubymUEa7Q_IDQXdoRvNtJBblZSeI/s1600/The+Designated+Driver+2010+22x22.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2YNyFIE695XKUdI4pkQNPXJJ3jldMEgcDc1bwqNvd1PR3_wM_3cHqBX4UxZHX8MZorgUTAXSKr8r1gEn_XNiOypu12M1nGMWsNriknSueUCjOzlAkubymUEa7Q_IDQXdoRvNtJBblZSeI/s320/The+Designated+Driver+2010+22x22.jpg" width="317" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Designated Driver - </i>acrylic - 2010 - 22" x 22"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b> </b></span></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-35043693161315207302011-04-10T23:02:00.000-07:002011-04-10T23:02:44.288-07:00All the Same, All Different: Pets, Pancakes, Persimmons, and other Projects<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I have my children to th<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">ank for bringing to my attention a principle which underlies some of my art projects and continues to suggest new directions--the principle of "the same only different." When they reached the mid-childhood stage of clamouring for little creatures in cages, my son and daughter had a reluctant and unreceptive mother who had no desire to share her home with</span></span> <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">smelly creatures that would eat and breed prodigiously and always need cleaning. My objections, however, were overruled, and over the years we accommodated hamsters, gerbils, budgies, guinea pigs, and a deformed fish which we babysat, and which its rightful owners (very sensibly) never got around to reclaiming.</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> I was not a total neophyte when it came to pets. I'd lived with various cats, and was well aware of each one's individuality, and accepted that dogs too had unique personalities; but the idiosyncrasies<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> demonstrated by all the diminutive fauna (even the fish, which once jumped out of its tank and was later rescued, still alive, from the dust bunnies under the bed)) came as a complete surprise to me. The gerbils, particularly, covered a whole range of personality traits, from the bold one who teased the cat through the bars of its cage until it got its face ripped off, to the dogged perseverer who learned to run in the exercise wheel in spite of having no front feet. These mouse-sized rodents were as different from each other as you are from me.</span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh00BhzXRO6x3xh7pgsTI2iEs3l2nMhSH6jlIwrAHNqF2HjX2NAtbq6FlddsOIzfTR1Mw5dUOGb4OksXLPiurht9E_l9WlRSvycchoObnDtJIqzdj1A3AEqfpA-A8wri9eZh65SuAs6IlvO/s1600/Paper+project.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh00BhzXRO6x3xh7pgsTI2iEs3l2nMhSH6jlIwrAHNqF2HjX2NAtbq6FlddsOIzfTR1Mw5dUOGb4OksXLPiurht9E_l9WlRSvycchoObnDtJIqzdj1A3AEqfpA-A8wri9eZh65SuAs6IlvO/s200/Paper+project.jpg" width="106" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLGkwXVyfftXQ9E8d1BHAjiOJykq5prXdeF9aWhvlsIAVHMZmsxMktmR0jwALapCe7Iwutmx1YSolmhQzhzR5r4P8FwWpJaQiLYSDzx5NU366HcFtWw_V9MxjDpVKGUZyRWbAWhBdH4Zy-/s1600/Paper+project+detail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="132" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLGkwXVyfftXQ9E8d1BHAjiOJykq5prXdeF9aWhvlsIAVHMZmsxMktmR0jwALapCe7Iwutmx1YSolmhQzhzR5r4P8FwWpJaQiLYSDzx5NU366HcFtWw_V9MxjDpVKGUZyRWbAWhBdH4Zy-/s200/Paper+project+detail.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The first time this principle cropped up in an art project was during an intensive summer course in paper-making. We made batches of pulp and were then expected to create something with it. I don't think I had any idea what I was going to do, but I started to produce, at an increasingly frenetic pace, two kinds of object. I twisted strips of nylon stockings and dipped them in the pulp, hanging them up to dry in the sun; and I slapped handfuls of the pulp on to inflated balloons, producing leaf-shaped objects. I had never worked so obsessively in my life. And what fascinated me was that I kept doing the same thing, yet the results were all different.</span></span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> I continued <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">dipping and moulding until time ran short, and then I assembled my whole inventory on a frame. I remember thinking that the pieces were metaphors for human beings--all the same, all different.</span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl3Mj93YugL0FegB20PcEDjZY-C8f6I15jKJ-5BRLYqtxwNQ3E6cBhvIffsg5UvCBpgCFuj_wbuyfSmiAa0TGS4XoWqBBry1IEiiCHiGh4egLMz1emNYCqRevX0kZNodG6lZqJIAV1koQx/s1600/Pancake+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="174" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl3Mj93YugL0FegB20PcEDjZY-C8f6I15jKJ-5BRLYqtxwNQ3E6cBhvIffsg5UvCBpgCFuj_wbuyfSmiAa0TGS4XoWqBBry1IEiiCHiGh4egLMz1emNYCqRevX0kZNodG6lZqJIAV1koQx/s200/Pancake+2.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Pancake 2 - </i>white china marker - 19" x 21" </td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In January 2005, while casting around for a theme for my last-but-one term at Emily Carr, I happened to cook up a batch of thin pancakes (crepes.) Watching them solidify and change colour in the pan, I was once again struck by how each one, though made in the same way, was unique. For the next two months I cooked, drew, photographed, and occasionally even <b>ate </b>pancakes. I began with a series of detailed drawings of the flat discs, showing their ridges, grooves and craters as accurately as possible.</span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDcrLTSQRKK_frM7WPU2k7_3boyWXlqQyH7EULKkhyq9HFi0zkFopQ5b0q6hKzwZ9_Fpg2cGkGOVblK2vzuZvIAa8HtL3rw3z4eQ_0G3IruJtPPPfN6lFbT75S7VkI6qC4kIhM4AfBidsl/s1600/Fish+nor+Fowl.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="169" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDcrLTSQRKK_frM7WPU2k7_3boyWXlqQyH7EULKkhyq9HFi0zkFopQ5b0q6hKzwZ9_Fpg2cGkGOVblK2vzuZvIAa8HtL3rw3z4eQ_0G3IruJtPPPfN6lFbT75S7VkI6qC4kIhM4AfBidsl/s320/Fish+nor+Fowl.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Fish nor Fowl - </i>oil sticks - 15" x 29"</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy7YKTulMgBAVMLtuvjAuKJ6GhyphenhyphenNTqPXUBXfEACWZYg-FPvEe60N4_xxULC32b6tHJT-XyN1jQ_rLEc_qUdq6mMqyLRW4KCc9cqjTD6naRGwa-3aW3792l0OKYpkJ-Wgohczn16kizY9Ep/s1600/Out+of+the+Frying+Pan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy7YKTulMgBAVMLtuvjAuKJ6GhyphenhyphenNTqPXUBXfEACWZYg-FPvEe60N4_xxULC32b6tHJT-XyN1jQ_rLEc_qUdq6mMqyLRW4KCc9cqjTD6naRGwa-3aW3792l0OKYpkJ-Wgohczn16kizY9Ep/s320/Out+of+the+Frying+Pan.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Out of the Frying Pan - </i>oil sticks - 21" x 29"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Next I concentrated on segments and edges, and as I enlarged the markings, concentrating on rendering them accurately, whimsical life forms emerged, as in the examples on the left. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">After that I let some of the crepes dry out for a week or so, and documented the distorted shapes that they made as they curled up. These I did <b>not</b> eat. To my surprise they turned into bizarre skull- and mask-like forms.</span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaFQdA_kjrABtvOVjQNgLi_8E7BxcsjjLod9ujWtv10Zi4zzdUx83zYi6tsVcTPozvhomxLj8nmQEzaCOkOq_DBSixLnUcWnHzbwuXg6k7LNK8urVAdD7cFabPfwLPXwa1VCbDNUqngKEB/s1600/Crepe-Mask+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaFQdA_kjrABtvOVjQNgLi_8E7BxcsjjLod9ujWtv10Zi4zzdUx83zYi6tsVcTPozvhomxLj8nmQEzaCOkOq_DBSixLnUcWnHzbwuXg6k7LNK8urVAdD7cFabPfwLPXwa1VCbDNUqngKEB/s320/Crepe-Mask+1.jpg" width="232" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Crepe-Mask 1</i> - conte crayon - 30" x 23"<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimoVGoxvrD-0xnmLd39at7WNot9Hro4qxGNPtyz7a6LPKO7FkR8gV809sfR7IuzDZX7uUnVyooB10EbNdHravlX3WgdRmtWhIxojKwTySekkI_plVKAz-6ZdkOwWgsSJLc4ZKYmelpNrfd/s1600/Crepe-World.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="284" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimoVGoxvrD-0xnmLd39at7WNot9Hro4qxGNPtyz7a6LPKO7FkR8gV809sfR7IuzDZX7uUnVyooB10EbNdHravlX3WgdRmtWhIxojKwTySekkI_plVKAz-6ZdkOwWgsSJLc4ZKYmelpNrfd/s320/Crepe-World.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Crepe-World - </i>oil sticks on canvas on board - 36" x 42"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The last step in the Pancake Project was Crepe-World, a large drawing on canvas.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Did you guess what the images I included last week represented? I've found in the past that people's suggestions have ranged from the microscopic to the cosmic--single cells to heavenly bodies!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In 2006 I had a commission to paint something for a newly renovated kitchen. The clients wanted something about 24" x 36" and they liked some of the oversized still life subjects I'd worked on. Since the wife said she was particularly fond of persimmons, I suggested that instead of one painting I should do six small ones, 10" x 10" square, each one of a different persimmon. I discovered, as with the hamsters and gerbils, that each one was unique, with its own rosette of leaves. I also learned how to enjoy eating persimmons, avoiding the astringent fibres that come with some varieties. </span></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj279ZKItEN2XUicQt8850jTpbnurCtGcejvyTu45e9WtFzrZJO9dWhNp4UQK9kdgDL0jGaJ-ljBTYqoL4jXIBALbQ0I2nb2aLDrXlVA_Gd9LZcNdqFyIyRlZsTS77JDaUcDW2_eA-e8MjS/s1600/Six+Persimmons.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj279ZKItEN2XUicQt8850jTpbnurCtGcejvyTu45e9WtFzrZJO9dWhNp4UQK9kdgDL0jGaJ-ljBTYqoL4jXIBALbQ0I2nb2aLDrXlVA_Gd9LZcNdqFyIyRlZsTS77JDaUcDW2_eA-e8MjS/s320/Six+Persimmons.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Six Persimmons - </i>acrylic on panels, each 10" x 10"<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jan. 1</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBHV2rhJAGBPyZExaNQDBkxejaBvw6DSqouJ88Y4GNM3naBkAGXsZZKJIJPu-3EB4ZaIODPDvzDdMRbVZ3nrhaeOUy4X1KiHmBwX88UulGmER1H5gnAE0lX1N_QhsU9d7PpI_pHgw1gEUs/s1600/02.+1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBHV2rhJAGBPyZExaNQDBkxejaBvw6DSqouJ88Y4GNM3naBkAGXsZZKJIJPu-3EB4ZaIODPDvzDdMRbVZ3nrhaeOUy4X1KiHmBwX88UulGmER1H5gnAE0lX1N_QhsU9d7PpI_pHgw1gEUs/s200/02.+1.JPG" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Feb. 1</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I have same-only-different projects in progress now, as well. As with the paper-making enterprise, I'm assembling things without knowing what I'll do with them all. For example, a new ritual for this year is taking the same photo every morning as soon as I get up. I'm not rigid about the timing, or about exactly how much of the scene I include, and there will be times when I'm away and there will be gaps in my record; but by the end of the year I should have three hundred and something versions of the view from my living-room window. I point my camera towards the spot where on a clear day I can glimpse Mt. Baker, the 10,000 ft. volcano just over the border in Washington State. I include a bit of the magnolia tree just outside, which is just, belatedly, coming into bloom. The sun, clouds, weather and tree are all variables which ensure that I never get exactly the same picture twice. All the same, all different.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWMJ01LE4PhxN6l6aQFICR1WdYPqZ76cHil1PPtIuFEkg9Q6SN-BZuKYJuNProWDR3fukaUWJb1yco2fb-eR_dk_LM2EhFkJctcp1nWe-Czrk5voaOe-BkBXYOXJ3IsWEZ2of53DmC3D0A/s1600/Feb.+27.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWMJ01LE4PhxN6l6aQFICR1WdYPqZ76cHil1PPtIuFEkg9Q6SN-BZuKYJuNProWDR3fukaUWJb1yco2fb-eR_dk_LM2EhFkJctcp1nWe-Czrk5voaOe-BkBXYOXJ3IsWEZ2of53DmC3D0A/s200/Feb.+27.JPG" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Feb.27</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0sPDawlcwGgUZ4bqlORqCyCSDedklbTxXrFU1NO1M8sG_5O4HYR9MwDyK6whPFBPyL9HwUUhyJhJBclqUzCPWZkbDsoOcXDpINlXH2jcSR8ZGQvKzQlmawa1hsHsnQ9Etbl15gsmP7cD_/s1600/04.10.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0sPDawlcwGgUZ4bqlORqCyCSDedklbTxXrFU1NO1M8sG_5O4HYR9MwDyK6whPFBPyL9HwUUhyJhJBclqUzCPWZkbDsoOcXDpINlXH2jcSR8ZGQvKzQlmawa1hsHsnQ9Etbl15gsmP7cD_/s200/04.10.jpg" width="200" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">April 10</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood" style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">www.MyArtClub.com/judith.fairwood</a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
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</div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: left;"><i>Next time (around April 17):</i> <b>Spotlight on Gastropods: "Van Huysum's Snails 1 and 2"</b></div><div style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; text-align: left;"><b><br />
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</a></div>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6687239821568597340.post-54240346494424405452011-04-03T10:22:00.000-07:002011-04-03T10:22:02.674-07:00Thoughts about Readers' Comments<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><i>This week I am responding to some comments from readers that raise questions in my mind, and which you too may have wondered about. I am including images of some drawings that I plan to write about next time--but I'm not giving titles or telling you what they are. See if you can guess! (If you already know, please don't let on!)</i> </span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsTQfZ4MRTj67oXX2ukWR6ShGQUnGuARbtJw0EM-9sY3UFU4Uex_9sdv0dj3xYxCV-GAxwmeA1tu3bDEKWVQGfaTCdRiTr63msgcZF6g7SSg3V8y-gjDH1QcqxfFDB1K3bliqjJdQOke1y/s1600/Pancake+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="174" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsTQfZ4MRTj67oXX2ukWR6ShGQUnGuARbtJw0EM-9sY3UFU4Uex_9sdv0dj3xYxCV-GAxwmeA1tu3bDEKWVQGfaTCdRiTr63msgcZF6g7SSg3V8y-gjDH1QcqxfFDB1K3bliqjJdQOke1y/s200/Pancake+2.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEin2u6_sgBfugXIe4av_p9Zokg8bdckD6Eupi7yCryxJg073geWJF5odEV8mSId77H-OLh-661IdrZCbF7BBPGYdQlZBrZCrUpAtrPQ7A7r_itzVYsSWmkRRZ688YLkM60WlIF2krMC6T01/s1600/Pancake+3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="177" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEin2u6_sgBfugXIe4av_p9Zokg8bdckD6Eupi7yCryxJg073geWJF5odEV8mSId77H-OLh-661IdrZCbF7BBPGYdQlZBrZCrUpAtrPQ7A7r_itzVYsSWmkRRZ688YLkM60WlIF2krMC6T01/s200/Pancake+3.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The enthusiastic comments about Easel Talk that I have received indicate that many people, from widely differing backgrounds, enjoy reading the stories about my paintings. ( I realize, of course, that <b>un</b>favourable sentiments are less likely to reach me, if only because people who don't like my stuff will have long since stopped reading it!) Compliments are lovely, and most encouraging, but just as welcome are comments that raise thought-provoking questions, such as this one from a reader who had just read the entry on "Foreign Hotel" (Feb. 14, 2011): "I found that I wished that I had looked at your painting more carefully before reading the blog, because once you had described the various interpretations I was no longer sure what my impressions would have been." </span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDMI9NQqEb0tYwSbfSxAwoohGIhnHI-96b3AsihSmuGxEFgiyxfIN3B1dnxiykHfPvxNwY89ul8bUD-ZMrhsJlWkSGKfysUzxq5P98EZ0X8_qhQC7BWy5DgAnn7k4QuKr1VAINHAD0VSji/s1600/Pancake+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDMI9NQqEb0tYwSbfSxAwoohGIhnHI-96b3AsihSmuGxEFgiyxfIN3B1dnxiykHfPvxNwY89ul8bUD-ZMrhsJlWkSGKfysUzxq5P98EZ0X8_qhQC7BWy5DgAnn7k4QuKr1VAINHAD0VSji/s200/Pancake+1.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The reader had opened my email notifications in the wrong order. I had in fact included a preview of "Foreign Hotel" the week before. Nevertheless, she raised some valid questions: to what extent do I as the artist want to influence how people react to my work, and to what extent do viewers want to be influenced? Should art stand alone and speak for itself, allowing viewers to form their own impressions? Might a person feel cheated of a spontaneous reaction by having the artist spell it all out? Or does learning about the context of the work and the artist's feelings about it enhance and enrich the viewing experience? Personally, I've always found that some background knowledge made the work more interesting, and enough readers of Easel Talk, including several who describe themselves as not particularly visual, have told me that they appreciate the added dimension--and even compared me to art exponents in museums and on TV!--that I feel justified in continuing. Still, it <b>is</b> important to have an unmediated response first, so please take advantage of the previews. I also invite your opinions on what constitutes the right kind and amount of information.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiccUpSj3j6-crDfrayZfkVu_-BBnJguk6hP0YGNFeGC5JbGk31e4H0aaM7VK4M94zE2ZMtAma6sl6id2qNT8HQmolGZ_oEmfNRzERtzKcJrerkG-iO8wmOku3cHx7bRoIadYtQRYwBa84L/s1600/Pancake+4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiccUpSj3j6-crDfrayZfkVu_-BBnJguk6hP0YGNFeGC5JbGk31e4H0aaM7VK4M94zE2ZMtAma6sl6id2qNT8HQmolGZ_oEmfNRzERtzKcJrerkG-iO8wmOku3cHx7bRoIadYtQRYwBa84L/s200/Pancake+4.jpg" width="200" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Related to this issue is the question of <b>titles. </b>I've always enjoyed naming things--as a small child I named vast families of children I dreamed of having when I grew up--and I like choosing titles for paintings. I'm in the process of reviewing the titles I've come up with so far, trying to decide why I settled on each one, and whether it works. The topic arose out of an exchange of emails following my post on "On the Ferry" (March 6, 2011). Knowing that my correspondent had spent vacations in the Cancun area, I remarked that she had probably travelled on the ferry in the painting, to which she replied, "Couldn't it be <b>any</b> ferry?"</span><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvd92M_ulCMsvFTC2yYozGOPuwesSGgk3WsXr9AtJzfGtR2pxdV2NbMiGPabVuQZVGi76sh1WTllbR4dydJfolJhM8guyVst_17U0Hl6vruOZuMHVpGnNTbyKIofgABVTduIoLnMwCenJp/s1600/On+the+Ferry+08+32x24.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvd92M_ulCMsvFTC2yYozGOPuwesSGgk3WsXr9AtJzfGtR2pxdV2NbMiGPabVuQZVGi76sh1WTllbR4dydJfolJhM8guyVst_17U0Hl6vruOZuMHVpGnNTbyKIofgABVTduIoLnMwCenJp/s200/On+the+Ferry+08+32x24.jpg" width="148" /></a><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Well yes, it could--at least until I identified its location in my blog--and that's why I didn't call it "On the <b>Cancun</b> ferry." I debated whether it was more likely to sell if I left it vague--it might appeal to someone with fond memories of a ferry in Asia or the Mediterranean region--or whether the specific reference would give it a better chance with people who had spent time in Mexico. I've yet to find out! I think my titles are an attempt to pinpoint what is most important to me about the subject. Usually, I have something in mind which is implicit in the painting, but may or may not be perceived by someone else. For example, in the small painting that I called "Quintet", I was thinking of the perky little percussion instruments called high-hats.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUqo3eHDUop_Dm6YEyM5mcAZ4FKZjNqJknTGIyAWfFt07eCQv_32L5T6wirLYxjE9yB0u35MIqnr5bO4O9N5yJWe-HeeLuTP5NlX1ZZGrLznB23DseShKno5DLHHTTYhuHmYAYakh-PMkS/s1600/Quintet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUqo3eHDUop_Dm6YEyM5mcAZ4FKZjNqJknTGIyAWfFt07eCQv_32L5T6wirLYxjE9yB0u35MIqnr5bO4O9N5yJWe-HeeLuTP5NlX1ZZGrLznB23DseShKno5DLHHTTYhuHmYAYakh-PMkS/s200/Quintet.jpg" width="198" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Quintet </i>- acrylic - 2010 - 12" x 12"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Titles are especially perplexing when it comes to non-representational painting. Personally I feel let down when I read "Composition" or "Abstraction"on the label, even though that is exactly what the painting is. I <b>like </b>titles, and for me a good one is a kind of mini-poem that enhances the visual aspect. It's not always easy to choose something that feels right, though. Below is an abstract painting that was produced quickly and intuitively, without any preconceived ideas about subject matter. The result seemed to me to have architectural elements, a mystery, and a ghostly presence. I've tried several titles, but none of them really satisfies me. I started with "Haunted House", switched to "Who's in There?" and most recently, "Anyone Home?" Maybe I should just call it "Mystery"?</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh17fS3KfSS4i-yp4YqFYQxKbEGA6t_dmzcmWh5ffEJQ3ITgoAfu66TmVoqNaScKVcyDj0USbwqqUVPryi60ndwIegXWrHCAUgUr-EsCCiz-LZisuX3SGTtxCXvjFrDoOQLv7XKTmSoU4E_/s1600/Who%2527s+in+there.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh17fS3KfSS4i-yp4YqFYQxKbEGA6t_dmzcmWh5ffEJQ3ITgoAfu66TmVoqNaScKVcyDj0USbwqqUVPryi60ndwIegXWrHCAUgUr-EsCCiz-LZisuX3SGTtxCXvjFrDoOQLv7XKTmSoU4E_/s320/Who%2527s+in+there.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>To be renamed? - </i>acrylic on paper - 2002 - 23" x 30"</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I think I did better with "Winter," another intuitive abstract. When painting it I was thinking only of the mark-making, and of economical use of means and colour. It turned out being so suggestive of winter in a cold climate that one woman who saw it remarked, "I'm from Saskatchewan, and it looks <b>just </b>like that!"</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg76hDiYK1WU7jYI93xyFDaAqQ7Zvo2EChMuWQLy-KksKu7QSeQBCP5Lg-R8fSf7ZB-UvvRbuePJOIW5k5uYmqtkWj_C2-rGHvtGAj7IykKZe5wh_6gBY-BIrX4Abu5UBBdF_ooYOx9KQq2/s1600/Winter.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="241" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg76hDiYK1WU7jYI93xyFDaAqQ7Zvo2EChMuWQLy-KksKu7QSeQBCP5Lg-R8fSf7ZB-UvvRbuePJOIW5k5uYmqtkWj_C2-rGHvtGAj7IykKZe5wh_6gBY-BIrX4Abu5UBBdF_ooYOx9KQq2/s320/Winter.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Winter - </i>acrylic on paper - 2002 - 23" x 30"</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br />
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</tbody></table><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Enough for this week. I have more issues to discuss that have been raised by readers' comments, but will come back to them at a future date. </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br />
</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <a href="http://www.myartclub.com/judith.fairwood">www.MyArtClub.com/judith.fairwood</a></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.twitter.com/EaselChirps">www.twitter.com/EaselChirps</a> </span></div><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Next time (around April 9): </span></i><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><b>All the Same, All Different</b>: <b>The Mystery Drawings!</b></span></div><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> </span>Judithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15608566364717129609noreply@blogger.com0